


Magician's Misjudgment

by abstractconcept, the_con_cept (abstractconcept)



Category: Mairelon the Magician - Patricia Wrede
Genre: Adventure, F/M, Found Families, Hijinks, Magic, Mystery, Regency, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-16
Updated: 2013-12-16
Packaged: 2018-01-04 21:35:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 21,722
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1085940
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/abstractconcept/pseuds/abstractconcept, https://archiveofourown.org/users/abstractconcept/pseuds/the_con_cept
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Kim and Mairelon's pasts intrude on their life when an act of charity results in a dire warning; a mysterious woman is after revenge. Their magic is being leeched by an unknown adversary. It's up to Kim, Mairelon and a young friend to track the woman down, and without magic, Kim will have to rely on her wits, her fists and her friendships.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Magician's Misjudgment

**Author's Note:**

> Set just a little bit after _Magician’s Ward_ /Kim and Richard become engaged.  
> Beta Read by Isisanubis and Adele_sparks. <3

Kim was bound to a chair. It was not an auspicious turn of events.

The man with the cap gave them a wide grin, stretching the scar on his cheek. “. . . and by the way; Rudolph Hamill said to say ’ello.” He shut the door of the small room and Kim heard him thump downstairs.

Kim twisted her hands back and forth, but all that did was make the bonds chafe. “So. Since we don’t got anything better to do at the moment, why don’t you tell me who Rudolph Hamill is, and what you did to set up his bristles?”

“Hamill is an old friend of mine . . . well, I say friend,” she heard Mairelon respond. He was tied up directly behind her. 

Kim snorted. She rocked back and forth, testing the rope. “How’d you get us mixed up in this havey-cavey business? Why’d Hamill want to kidnap you and steal that box Shoreham wanted? Did you do something to wind him up?”

“It’s a bit of a long story. There was an incident while I was in Germany involving a Countess, a late-night game of dice and a good amount of brandy, and in the end I . . . well, I convinced Hamill that the Countess’ spaniel was the reincarnation of the Seventh Earl of Barrymore; as such, Hamill went on to steal the spaniel, which. . . it’s all very complicated. Suffice it to say that the shine rather went off me when he discovered I was only joking about the spaniel.”

Kim groaned. “Only you could get in the suds like that.” Much as she loved Mairelon, she did wonder if their entire marriage would end up being a series of reckless capers. On the other hand, being tied up hand and foot was not a lot worse than a Society dinner. 

“I do seem to have a knack for it.” Mairelon didn’t sound the least bit upset. “At any rate, the long and the short of it is that he went away minus the spaniel and without the coin as well. I fancy he considers this his vengeance, sending Barker to steal the Graves Snuffbox before I could deliver it safely to Shoreham.”

Kim thought she might be able to work a hand loose. “What’s so exciting about that box, anyway? Or is he wanting it just to put your back up?”

“Actually, the box would be valuable to anyone, but possibly moreso to someone like Hamill . . . it has the rather unique ability to magically dispatch someone even at a great distance.”

Kim froze. “You mean you can _murder_ someone with it!?” she exclaimed. 

“Yes, and think how rare that is, an object which does not even have to be near the subject of the—”

“If he gets his dobs on it he’s going to snuff _us_ ,” Kim snarled. 

“Well. Yes. I suppose that might be his eventual intent,” Mairelon said pensively. 

Barker probably wouldn’t even waste the box’s power on her, but Mairelon … he almost never took a threat seriously, and he was being particularly airy about their situation today. That cove Barker was probably getting ready to use the box right now. The thought made her struggle harder, shifting and squirming as she tried to work a hand loose. Mairelon was still blithering. Kim couldn’t hear him over the blood rushing in her ears. Fear made Kim strive against the ropes. She gave such a twist that the chair fell over with a thump. Her panic worked to her advantage; her wrists were sweating and it was making them slippery. The binds were almost loose enough to free one hand. 

_Just . . . another . . . moment, and_ —Mairelon’s sharp tinkling words flooded the room, and suddenly Kim was free. She blinked and sat up. She was on the floor in front of the hearth, hair wild and clothing in disarray. She looked up, disconcerted, to see Mairelon adjusting his cufflinks, looking dapper and unruffled. His chair was still upright and he hadn’t a hair out of place. 

Kim felt like a candle that had been blown out just as it had got lit. “ _Mairelon_ ,” she snapped, exasperated for some reason she couldn’t name. 

He looked at her, eyebrows raised. “Need a hand?” He helped her to her feet, then gave her a charming smile. “We should probably catch up to Barker before he does something rash.”

Kim huffed. “He’s probably halfway to France by now, at any rate; we gave him a long enough head start,” she replied, morosely trying to straighten her hair, or at least get it out of her eyes.

“Nonsense. There’s only the one cart and I put Scrobbe’s Golden Halter on the horses, so they’re not going anywhere. He may run into the forest, but there’s only one good path back to town and he’ll discover that soon enough. No,” Richard said, reaching out to brush Kim’s hair out of her face, ignoring her blush, “ _my_ only worry is that he’ll realize the only way to take the spell off the horses would be to use the snuff box to dispatch me. You see, if a magician dies, any spell he’s currently exerting energy on will fail. That would allow him to be off with the cart. But I don’t think Barker has the sense God gave a goose, let alone enough to start fiddling with complicated magical instruments.”

Kim followed Mairelon downstairs, grumbling under her breath that Mairelon had less sense than most geese she knew. Even so, when they exited the empty country house where they’d been held, they discovered Barker had even less sense than that; not only had he failed to try using the snuffbox; he hadn’t even thought to try running off. He was still standing in the lane, screaming useless imprecations at the placid horses.

“There, you see?” Mairelon said, beaming. He gave Kim a half bow and affably doffed an invisible hat. “If you would be so good as to cast the invocation I showed you yesterday, we can take this fellow back to London and return the snuffbox to Shoreham . . . after having a good look at it ourselves,” he added, eyes agleam with a familiar eagerness. 

Kim rolled her eyes and took off her gloves to make things easier when she cast the invocation to paralyze Barker. “You know,” she told Mairelon, “one of these days you’ll find out that magic don’t solve everything.”

“Doesn’t,” Richard Merrill corrected with a dazzling smile. Kim cast the spell and he turned to watch Barker fall to the ground with a squawk. “Doesn’t it?”

oOoOoOo

“My feet are killing me,” Kim complained. “Ain’t—aren’t we about finished?”

“Just one more stop,” Mairelon promised. Kim almost sighed in relief until Mairelon added, “I need to visit the lending library.”

“Oh, no,” Kim groaned. 

Mairelon stopped, blinking. “Whatever’s the matter? You’ll be able to stop and sit awhile and rest your feet.”

“Oh, no!” Mairelon could get so deep in a book that he’d forget to come up for air or water. Kim leaned back against one of the storefronts, getting out of the flow of foot traffic. It was one of the first really nice spring days, and everyone was eager to be outside, visiting the shops or even just standing about to admire the array of goods arranged in the windows. The crowds just made Kim’s palms itch; the pickings would have been lush had she still been a thief. Kim shifted her weight and tried to wiggle her toes and work some life back into them. They’d been all over the markets, preparing for their upcoming wedding. “We’ll be in there for _hours_ ,” Kim groaned.

“We might. Did you want me to have a carriage take you home?” 

“No, that’s all right,” Kim said quickly. Mrs. Lowe was visiting and, though she’d mellowed a bit now that Kim and Richard were engaged, Kim still didn’t fancy being stuck with her, especially not on a nice day like this. Not when she could be out with Mairelon instead, even if he was being a little pigheaded. 

Mairelon’s smile softened, almost as though he could read her mind. “After we’ve picked up the books we’ll head straight home and I’ll have them draw you a footbath,” he promised. “And then we’ll go over those Latin verbs that have been giving you such trouble.”

Kim frowned. “I don’t—” She saw something from the corner of her eye and broke off. 

“What is it?”

Tugging at her bonnet, Kim looked around. There were a lot of people milling about, going from shop to shop, but nothing much out of place. “It’s this wretched hat,” she complained. “Gets in the way, that’s all.”

“I’m afraid a lady wouldn’t _dream_ of being seen in public without one,” Mairelon told her. She could hear the smile in his voice. 

It was all very well for _him_ to tease. He wasn’t expected to walk about with a fruit salad on his head. It didn’t suit her and the grapes dangled down and made it hard to see. “You can laugh, but I feel daft going about with someone’s supper on my head.”

“It is a bit silly,” Mairelon agreed. 

Kim looked up—just in time to see a skinny boy nudge Mairelon hard as he passed. 

“Sorry, guv—” the boy muttered, but Kim’s hand had already shot out, and she grabbed his wrist. The boy looked up in shock. He tried to jerk out of her grip, but Kim had lots of experience at this sort of thing. 

The boy was young—ten or twelve, maybe—and had fair, curly hair and a great streak of dirt across his face. Kim fought back a powerful feeling of déjà vu. How many boys just like this had she known over the years? He scowled at her. “Oy! What are you—”

Mairelon watched in surprise as Kim yanked the youth closer. “Listen,” she growled. “You’ll return that watch you just knuckled, or I’ll see you flogged, if you’re lucky.”

“I don’t know what you’re on about,” the boy protested. He gave her a wounded pup sort of look, but it didn’t gammon her. He knew what he was about, and so did she.

“No? I’ve twigged your game, so give it back.”

Kim felt a mixture of guilt and satisfaction as she watched the color drain out of the boy’s face. “All right. You smoked me. ’Ow’d you know I did that?”

Kim smirked as the boy surreptitiously offered Mairelon his watch back. “Worst dive I ever saw,” she said with a sniff. 

He took offense to that, puffing himself up. “Well, it ain’t my usual lay. I’m a good dubber, but I don’t do this much.”

“Who put you up to it?” Kim didn’t let go.

“No one. I got my own lay.”

“Dangerous to be on your own,” Kim commented quietly. 

The boy shrugged, his green eyes defiant. 

Kim pressed a couple of coins into his hand. “Take these and get something to eat. And some good shoes. Go to Tom Correy and tell him Kim Merrill sent you; he’ll find you something.”

The boy stared in disbelief. “You’re giving me money?”

“It ain’t a sham. Just take it.”

The boy still didn’t look convinced. “Why shoes?”

“Because if you ain’t going to be a rum diver, you’d best be able to run away fast,” she told him dryly. She let go of his arm. 

He stood there another moment, looking at her uncertainly. Kim understood; she could easily give him the money, let him start walking away, then give a hue and cry. She wouldn’t do that, but he had no call to know it. “Thanks,” he said eventually.

Kim gave him a curt nod.

“Guess I ought to give this back, then.” The boy held up a small roll of parchment bound with a bit of red ribbon.

Kim’s jaw dropped. “That’s my—”

“Sorry,” the boy blurted. He dropped the paper into her open palm and bolted, leaving Kim and Mairelon gazing after him. 

Mairelon arched a brow. “It looks as though he wasn’t as incompetent as he appeared.” He took Kim’s arm. “You know, I think I’ve changed my mind. I feel I’ve had enough adventure for one day, don’t you?”

Kim grunted and secreted the little roll back in her skirts. “I shouldn’t have done it,” she muttered as they walked back to their carriage. “It’ll only encourage him.”

“If you hadn’t given him the money, you wouldn’t have gotten your _obelios_ back, which would have been a shame,” Mairelon said in a mild voice. 

Kim winced. Of course he’d have spotted it. “How’d you know?”

He smiled brightly. “I found some of your early drafts in the waste bin. You should burn them, in the future,” he advised. “When I was younger I had a cat who liked to get at crumpled pieces of paper. And I use that in the past tense.”

“It killed the cat?” Kim said, alarmed. 

“No, no; she just lost her interest in fishing scraps of paper out of the waste bins,” he assured her. “In fact, she developed quite a wariness about them after that incident. But it taught me not to leave them about. What does that one do?”

“Lobs a ball of fire about a foot in diameter,” Kim informed him, waiting for the inevitable reprimand.

“What a good thing you didn’t let it fall into the wrong hands,” was the only forthcoming remark. “Speaking of which; don’t let Aunt Agatha find it. She’d have my head off with it the first time I was late for supper.”

Kim gave him a relieved grin. “She wouldn’t do that,” she assured him.

“No?” Mairelon’s eyebrows rose as if he doubted this. He helped her into the carriage and climbed in after her, and they set off for home. 

“Throwing fireballs at supper is probably unseemly.”

Mairelon laughed. “Mildly discourteous, at the very least. You seem to be quite taken with the _obelios_ ,” he added, changing the subject. “What has you so interested in them?”

Kim shrugged. She struggled to put her thoughts on the subject into words. “They’re handy, like, and they’re lightweight and all. I think they’re even better than infusing an object with magic, ‘cause you don’t got to worry about busting the object and losing the magic inside. And of course it completely disappears after you use it,” she explained. “Lord Kerring demonstrated one for me, and I really liked that you can carry it with you anywhere and use it at a moment’s notice, and you don’t even need magic to trigger it.”

“Which is also what makes it inherently dangerous,” Mairelon pointed out, not unkindly.

“Well, that’s true enough.” And something she hadn’t thought about prior to nearly having one stolen off her, Kim had to admit. “Still, it’s one of the most practical, least cork-brained ways of doing a spell that I’ve seen. And I always like having one, just in case.”

“In case of what?”

“With you around? Practically anything. Not that I’m complaining, exactly,” Kim hastened to add. “But it seems like every other day we’re getting kidnapped by some duffer who wants revenge on you for something that happened years ago in France, or we’re being held at gunpoint by vigilantes you once tricked out of some coin.”

“I can’t help that I’m popular. It’s my fetching personality,” Mairelon said with a breezy gesture. 

“Ha, right. Anyhow, I got to be on my toes, and having an _obelios_ might come in useful.”

“I suppose it might. You know, _obelios_ means ‘wafer’ in Greek,” Mairelon told her. “Because charlatans used to buy them off of real wizards, then hide them under their tongues and pretend to do things like breathe fire.”

“Sounds like they were aiming to get their lips burned off,” Kim mumbled. When Mairelon got into one of his lectures, he was good for an hour or more. 

“I imagine there were a few singed beards,” he agreed. 

Kim snorted. She looked away, but barely saw the passing scenery; the storefronts and crowds became a blur. Her head was elsewhere. Mairelon began rattling off facts about the history of the _obelios_ , but it all faded into the background. She wondered what would become of the street boy. It seemed impossible that he would stumble into a fate as lucky as hers—to be plucked off the streets by a toff; there couldn’t be another toff in London as sapsculled as Richard Merrill. Kim sighed. The boy would be pinched eventually; odds were always against a thief. Sooner or later, he’d be caught and imprisoned or hanged. Kim wasn’t sure which would be worse. At best, he could hope to be transported like Sam was. Thinking about it made her feel downcast. A few coin would ease his way for a little while, but in the end he’d probably come to the same fate anyway. 

“It’s a fascinating horse,” Mairelon commented, drawing her out of her brooding thoughts. “Spirited temper.”

“What?” Kim said, thoroughly confused. 

Mairelon nodded to a horse as they passed. “You were staring, so I assumed you were quite taken with it,” he said innocently. 

“Oh.” Kim looked away again. She didn’t really want to be drawn into conversation.

Mairelon sighed. After a moment she felt him take her hand. Her face grew warm; would she ever get used to the idea of his body being in such close proximity? It was nice, but odd and unsettling. “You were a thousand miles away,” he told her. “What’s wrong? Are you wishing you could have done more for the boy?”

“Sort of,” Kim said with a sigh. She looked away again. “It’s just . . . he reminds me of someone I used to know.” 

Mairelon squeezed her hand. “Tell me about him,” he suggested. His blue eyes were sympathetic.

Kim gave a little shrug. “Not much to tell. He was one of our gang, the oldest of the lot of us. He could be nice when the mood was on him, but he had a wicked temper too, so you never wanted to get on his bad side. Looked just like that, though—curls and freckles and bright, clever eyes. He was charming; a real dimber-cove.” She smiled faintly. “We used to call him Dandy Sam. Sam Bennett, his name was. I remember once, we’d had a bad time of it, hadn’t pinched so much as a coin in a whole week, and I was so hungry! And we were passing this stall with all these apples, and I never seen—saw—anything so lovely, and I said so . . . I said something, at any rate, and then that night he took me aside from the others and he pulls out this apple, just as pretty as you please. I know he stole it, but I couldn’t think when he had the chance. He just pulled it out and winked at me and told me I’d have a safe to crack that night and I’d better be on my game. It was . . . it was thoughtful, like.”

She wondered if he’d feel jealous, or just angry, maybe—a lot of things that happened to her on the streets seemed to upset Mairelon—but he kept on looking at her expectantly. “What happened to him?”

She smiled a wan smile. “He got transported. Like the others,” she said. She looked away again. She cursed herself for thinking about it; she did better letting it go. “It was my fault, really. The last lay—went all wrong. It was supposed to be easy—the house was good on the crack and I should’ve been able to jiggle that last lock open with a breath, it was so loose, but I wasn’t fast enough.”

Mairelon tactfully said nothing, but he kept holding her hand and that was enough.

“I dunno how the Runners discovered our rig, but they come down on us in the dark and—” Kim shook her head. Kim was one of the few who’d got away in the noise and confusion. Sam, Big Jim, and even Squeaks had all been transported to Australia, and Mother Tibbs, of course, had swung. If Kim had only been a little faster—

“I’m sorry,” Mairelon said in a quiet voice. “It sounds as though it was a traumatic experience for you.”

Kim wiped her eyes with the back of her hand, hard. “Not as traumatic as being transported,” she grunted. 

“Oh, I don’t know. They say Australia can be very pleasant this time of year.” Kim scowled. “They may have done very well for themselves. You never know.”

“Well . . . maybe,” Kim allowed. Mother Tibbs hadn’t, though. “If only I’d been quicker with that last lock.” She leaned against his shoulder with a sigh. He slid an arm around her and held her tight. It felt right. It felt like home.

“Then you wouldn’t be here with me now,” Mairelon said lightly. “So whatever the cause, I’m very glad of it.” She could hear the smile in his voice.

She smiled as well, feeling just a little better. “So am I,” she agreed.

oOoOoOo

Kim swirled her spoon around in the bouillon without eating any. The table was chock-full of wonderful things to eat; fricassee of mutton chops, dishes full of oysters, stewed mushrooms, boiled chickens, rump steak and stewed cucumbers, not to mention the tureens of sauce all about. You could feed an army on one course! There was so much food on the table that the vegetables had their _own_ table, with the servants handing them around whenever someone was wishful. If only Kim had an appetite. She forced herself to eat anyway, but she felt bad for not enjoying it more. It was such a lovely house, as well; everything looked so pretty with the candles everywhere, and the chandelier above them, dripping with glittering grandeur. She half listened to Lord Stockton as he discussed the Prime Minister. She wished Lady Jersey hadn’t arranged for her to sit next to him; he had a rather braying sort of laugh that was giving her a headache.

“. . . he certainly set him back on his heels,” Lord Stockton said.

“Oh? Does he box, then?” Kim replied absently, prompting another bout of grating laughter.

“Hardly, my dear. We were talking about politics.”

“Oh, yes.”

“And you shouldn’t,” Lady Jersey put in. “It’s such a dull subject. Didn’t I see you at the opera the other night?” she added, deftly steering the conversation away from dangerous waters. 

The rest of the dinner party laughed and chatted merrily. Only Kim, near the end of the table, was stuck with a bore like Stockton.

Kim sighed. She couldn’t see Mairelon; a large centerpiece of silk flowers blocked her view. She could see the woman sitting next to him, though; she was a diamond of the first water, dark haired with lovely, wide-set eyes. Her gown was perfection as well—white crape over a satin slip, and bands of beads, and her hair was curled perfectly. She was elegant from head to toe, right down to the delicate necklace of pearls she kept toying with. She looked every inch like a real lady, and made Kim feel like a ragamuffin. Unfortunately, she kept staring coldly at Kim. Kim hadn’t the faintest idea what she’d done to offend the woman, except possibly to be engaged to Mairelon. Well, the mort would just have to get used to it. Mairelon was hers and that was all there was to it, and no matter how mutton-headed it was to marry a girl off the streets, he seemed to like her well enough, too. 

She went back to her soup, but couldn’t help noticing that Mairelon’s end of the table was laughing rather more than hers was. She found it especially galling that he was being charming while she had to put up with Lord Horsey-laugh. 

“I hadn’t seen you in this gown before,” Lady Jersey put in. “Blue is such a becoming color on you.”

Kim forced a smile. “Thank you. I shall pass on your compliments to Lady Wendall, as she chose the fabric.”

“She does have excellent taste.”

The evening continued to be excruciating, at least until tea was served and she could track down Mairelon. The look she gave him must have spoken volumes, because he chuckled at her expression. 

“Did you not enjoy Stockton’s riveting opinions on the state of our politicians’ morals?” he said, slipping an arm around her.

“Not hardly,” she replied vehemently. 

“I am sorry,” he said. 

“Don’t be. When I could get a word in edgewise I started in on the most recent developments in elemental alchemy,” Kim said smugly. “I managed to keep it going right up until it was time to retire to the drawing room. I don’t fancy he’ll be quick to want to sit next to me again.”

“Oh, good. That explains why he went from ogling you early in the dinner to looking rather green by the end.” Mairelon seemed very pleased with this.

“He wasn’t ogling me. Was he?”

“I imagine he thought he was being discreet. You mean to say you didn’t purposely put him in his place?”

Kim hadn’t even noticed. “Not for ogling. Just for being dull.”

Mairelon laughed. 

“Well, and what about you, anyway?” Kim said, nudging him. “You were dazzling everyone up at that end of the table with your wit; I heard ’em all laughing. I wouldn’t of been surprised if they all clapped in the end. And you sitting next to that beauty, too.”

“Don’t give me a trimming on account of that,” Mairelon protested with a chuckle. “I assure you, I could not have asked for a less convivial dinner companion. She barely said two words the entire evening. Odd, too, as Lady Jersey said she’d specifically asked to be seated near me.”

“Huh,” Kim said. “I caught her giving me black looks, as well.” Before she could say anything more on the subject,she was interrupted. 

“Hello, Mr. Merrill,” a woman said. It was a distinctly sarcastic voice, and both Kim and Richard turned. There was a woman looking imperiously at Richard, her Roman nose high in the air. Kim felt that at least it sort of went with her blonde ringlets which were, in the fashion of the day, distinctly Greek. 

“Oh! Hello, Sally. How is your brother, Thomas? I haven’t seen him since the war.”

If possible, the woman iced over even more. “It’s _Sarah_ ; I’m not a child anymore. In any case, more correctly, it’s Lady Clotworthy now.”

“Fitting,” Mairelon replied innocently. He turned to his fiancée and with just a slight bow added, “Kim, may I present Lady Clotworthy. She was a friend many years ago.”

Lady Clotworthy stood very tall in her lovely blue gown. “I used to help him as his assistant when he was first trying to learn stage magic.”

“Oh?” Kim said as respectfully as she could. She couldn’t see where this would rise to problems with Mairelon, but then he could find danger in a stroll though the park. 

“Yes. I was his assistant, until that day he was doing that innovative new miracle, ‘sawing the lady in half,’ and I was to be his lady,” she told Kim. Her voice got hard. “We were practicing in the conservatory when Bobby Eaton came in and informed Richard that there was something he _must_ see _immediately_.”

“Oh.” The look on Mairelon’s face suggested he had just remembered whatever incident had scarred Lady Clotworthy so deeply. 

“He said, ‘Wait here; I won’t be a moment.’ When I suggested I accompany him he _assured_ me that from Bobby’s voice, whatever it was sounded hazardous, and of course he did not wish to expose me to any danger.”

Mairelon began to look a little hunted. He glanced at Kim, and at her questioning look, tried to explain. “Well, you see, it was actually a watershed moment in magic; Bobby Eaton—his brother, ah, his older brother, Lord Eaton had just invented the very house wards we still use today. So. It—” Mairelon stopped and swallowed. “It was a significant, nay, an historical event.”

Kim tried not to let her amusement show. She had never seen him so ill at ease. She had to admit it was somewhat humorous to see him squirm.

Lady Clotworthy actually stamped her food. “Richard Merrill! You left me stuck in that box for hours! And don’t pretend you and your little chums are on the right side of history. You spent the afternoon throwing pebbles at the house to see how the wards reacted while I was _stuck in a box_ until supper!”

“I _am_ sorry. And I did apologize at the time,” Mairelon told her. 

Kim tried to look serious. “He said he was sorry,” she told Lady Clotworthy firmly. “He can’t do noth—that is, he can’t make up for it now, so I suggest you let the matter drop.”

Lady Clotworthy drew herself up in affronted shock. “It’s not the type of trauma one can simply set aside!”

“You don’t have to set it aside, but you don’t have to jaw us down.” 

“ _What?_ ”

“You heard me. I said muffle your clapper or shift your bob.” Kim crossed her arms over her chest. 

Lady Clotworthy gaped at her for a moment, then swept away. “Well!” was her parting remark.

“You really mustn’t use thieves’ cant at the ladies,” Mairelon reminded her. She gave him a sulky look and he patted her hand reassuringly. “It’s just that they won’t be able to understand what you’re saying. They’re at enough of a disadvantage around you without you throwing insults about in a bilingual fashion,” he told her, with a twinkle in his eye. 

“I think she understood me, right enough,” Kim replied, not giving an inch. “I told her to shift her bob, and shift it she did.”

“Well . . . she may have grasped the general thrust of your advice,” Mairelon admitted. He looked after Lady Clotworthy. “I’m amazed she’s still holding a grudge over that.”

“I wouldn’t be happy either, if you’d offered to saw me up then left me in a box,” Kim told him.

“I was _thirteen!_ ” Mairelon said defensively. “And anyway, I did apologize.”

“Nothing more you can do, then.” Kim shrugged.

“Would you like me to get you some punch? You must be parched after that little speech.” 

“Oh, go on, you,” she said gruffly, but in the end agreed that she would like some punch. As Mairelon went to fetch it, Kim drifted over to the fireplace, above which a tall portrait of Lady Jersey’s mother resided, young forever in her gilded frame. Lady Jersey and some of her friends were chatting near the roaring fire. Everyone had got very good at pretending Kim’s little outbursts were charming eccentricities, rather than vile social gaffes. Well, at least Lady Jersey had, anyway. Lady Jersey nodded to her, and Kim put on as pleasant a smile as she could manage. She felt a bit bad for Lady Jersey; her party had not been a great success so far.

“Hello, Miss Merrill,” Lady Jersey greeted her cordially. 

“It’s such a lovely party; thank you for inviting me,” Kim forced out. She felt she owed it, after speaking out of turn twice. “I apologize for my . . . words with Lady Clotworthy,” she added quietly.

“Nonsense; she’s been martyring herself forever. She has any number of upsets that she’s endured over the years; she collects complaints the way other people collect snuffboxes.” Lady Jersey smiled at her companions. “This is Miss Merrill, recently engaged to Richard Merrill,” she said. “Miss Merrill, this is Miss Gilmore and her patron, Lady Alford.” 

Miss Gilmore looked a bit old to be on the shelf, but this only made Kim respect her more for choosing not to get leg-shackled. She looked away from Kim and appeared to scrutinize the various gilded ornaments on the mantle. Lady Alford, on the other hand, looked both kind and shrewd. Kim wasn’t sure what to expect of her. Lady Alford smiled at Kim warmly. “What captivating eyes you have, Miss Merrill,” she remarked. “Such frankness and intelligence. I should like to paint you someday, if you’d be amenable.”

“Oh! I . . . that’s very kind of you, Lady Alford,” Kim said, taken by surprise. “I don’t know when I’d have time, I’m afraid.”

“The Viscountess is an accomplished artist,” Lady Jersey explained to Kim. 

“Oh? That’s bang up—er, that’s good. I’ve always admired artists,” Kim said politely. She hoped Lady Jersey could see she was on her absolute best behavior now. Or she was trying, anyway.

“Do you dabble in anything?” Lady Alford asked hopefully. “Needlework, perhaps?”

“I’m all thumbs at that,” Kim replied with a laugh. “I did try my hand at painting once—at one of Lady Wendell’s afternoon parties. She had paints and canvasses brought in for all the ladies, and a bowl of fruit to paint. It was . . . well, it was certainly entertaining, but I can’t claim to be able to make an apple look like an apple.”

“You should take instruction from Julia,” Lady Alford suggested, gesturing to her companion. “She’s very gifted.”

Miss Gilmore gave Kim a rather tight smile. “I’m afraid I’m feeling a bit tired,” she said, fanning herself. “I believe I shall sit.” Lady Alford fussed over her and the two of them went off to sit at the far end of the room. 

“Was it something I said?” Kim wondered aloud. 

Lady Jersey patted her hand. “Not at all. I’m afraid I didn’t expect Miss Gilmore to attend tonight, but perhaps I should have; she and Lady Alford are, after all, bosom bows.” She glanced about and lowered her voice, and Kim leaned forward obligingly; Lady Jersey always had the juciest gossip. “You see, Julia Gilmore had once held out for, well, for your Mr. Merrill.”

Kim gasped. “You mean to say she thought Mairelon was going to make her an offer?”

“If she thought so, it was without merit,” Mairelon’s voice interrupted. Kim turned. He looked a little displeased. “I only ever had two dances with her,” he said, handing Kim her punch.

“It was years ago,” Lady Jersey murmured. “And no, no one ever seriously expected it. I just wanted to explain why she might be a little cold to you.”

“Well . . . thank you for the warning,” Kim replied. She still felt unhappy. In truth, Miss Gilmore had done nothing wrong; she had excused herself from the situation as graciously as she could. And it shouldn’t come as a shock that a woman had been after Mairelon; after all, it had happened before. But it did make Kim wonder how many women had fancied him or, for that matter, how many still did; being engaged made him ineligible, but not invisible. He was handsome enough, and warm, and funny—a good catch for any girl.

“Miss Merrill, won’t you come sit? I ought to introduce you to Mrs. Simms. She’s been asking to make your acquaintance,” Lady Jersey said, changing the subject.

Feeling a bit puzzled, Kim followed Lady Jersey obediently, but took Mairelon’s hand and dragged him along. Whatever tortures of Society were to be inflicted on her, she reasoned she was subjected to them because of him, so it was only fitting that he endure them, too. 

To Kim’s shock, it was the dark-haired beauty who wanted to make her acquaintance, and her face transformed with a warm smile as Lady Jersey made the introductions. “This is Mrs. Simms,” Lady Jersey concluded.

“Emily, please,” Mrs. Simms corrected. She patted the seat beside her and Kim hesitantly took it. “I was so eager to meet you,” the woman told her. “But alas, I’m afraid I wasn’t clear enough when I told Lady Jersey and so I was seated next to the wrong Merrill!” She softened this startling announcement with a gentle laugh. 

Kim sneaked a glance at Mairelon, but he only seemed to find the revelation entertaining. “Why did you want to meet _me?_ ” Kim asked. She knew it wasn’t polite to just blurt it out, but she was curious and anyway, she preferred to be plain with people. 

“Well, I’m told that you had an interesting past, but rose in society to become an acclaimed magician.”

If this was meant to flatter Kim, it missed the mark. She frowned. “I’m just an apprentice—I certainly wouldn’t say I’m acclaimed at anything, except maybe thieving, which accounts for my ‘interesting past,’ such as it is.”

“You sell yourself short, I think,” Mrs. Simms replied, still smiling. “You’re well spoken of at the College.”

Kim relaxed a little. She had many friends at the Royal College of Wizards, and they were generous enough with their praise. “That’s kind of you to pass on,” Kim said. “Why did you want to know about me?”

“You see, I am also formerly of the streets,” the woman explained. “My parents died when I was quite young, and I grew up mostly around the rookery near St. Giles.”

“Oh,” Kim said. She wouldn’t have known from looking at the woman; she was well turned out, and seemed like she’d been born to it. “How did you get society inflicted on you?” Kim joked, feeling at ease now that she was on equal footing.

Mrs. Simms laughed brightly. “It is a change, isn’t it? I was lucky; I had a much wealthier cousin who eventually took me in. He had an enormous circle of friends, and I was fortunate enough to meet my husband through him.”

“I’m glad for you,” Kim told her, and meant it. It was hard being a girl on the streets, and the pitfalls were much worse than they were for boys. 

“From what I’ve heard, your story is more exciting,” Mrs. Simms said, toying with her necklace again. “Adventures, recovering the Saltash Set, learning magic—such a dizzying climb for a child who missed being transported to Australia by mere moments!”

“It’s been an interesting path,” Kim admitted wryly. 

“Do you think I could become a magician?”

“I’m afraid it isn’t a learned skill—that is, you have to be born with the ability before you can be taught.”

“And it’s rare, I’m sorry to say,” Mairelon added. 

“Ah, well,” Mrs. Simms replied, not seeming very downcast about it. “Still, it is nice to say I have the acquaintance of a real magician—someone a step above the rookery witches, I fancy.” She leaned forward eagerly, dark eyes gleaming. “Will you give me a demonstration, then? I’d love to see a real magic spell.”

Kim glanced at Mairelon and shrugged. “I guess so.” Raising her right hand and making a sweeping motion, she said, “ _Fiat avis_.” Five little birds of light popped into existence, trailing behind her fingers. They fluttered about the room, singing sweetly. The room gasped. Kim smiled shyly and folded her fingers in, one by one, and one by one, the birds returned—except one, which somehow escaped the pull and continued to flit about the chandelier. Kim scowled at it. “I never manage that last bird,” she grumbled. All the same, the room broke into applause.

Mairelon waved a hand in the bird’s direction and, with a word, the last bird dissipated into nothing at all. 

“That was _wonderful_ , just wonderful,” Mrs. Simms gushed. She finally stopped toying with her necklace long enough to applaud. “Thank you!”

_I shouldn’t of wasted real magic,_ Kim thought. _I should of just showed her the disappearing shilling trick. She’d of widdled herself, and I’d be up an easy shilling._

Mairelon gave Kim an approving smile. “Really, my dear, and I thought you said they’d be clapping for _me_.” His eyes twinkled gaily. 

“What’s that supposed to mean?” She mock glared at him. 

“Nothing whatever,” he insisted, but he couldn’t seem to help adding, in an undertone, “I’m going to bring that up next time you accuse me of needing to be the center of attention.”

“Oh, stow it, already.” Kim nudged him affectionately. 

“What a marvelous demonstration of your skill!” Lady Jersey exclaimed, hurrying over. 

“She’s progressing very nicely,” Mairelon said. “She’ll be levitating Duchesses before you know it.”

“Well, if she does, be sure to let me know so I can invite her to tea,” Lady Jersey said. “It would be the talk of the Season.” She looked around the drawing room, smiling. “Tonight’s illusion was certainly a success. Well done,” she told Kim.

“Thank you,” Kim replied. In a moment, other people had crowded round to congratulate her on her marvelous spell. 

Kim exchanged smiles with the hostess. Lady Jersey’s dinner party was a success after all.

oOoOoOo

Kim woke later than usual the next morning. She stretched, feeling the cool bedding against her skin. Despite the advanced hour, she still felt tired. She sat up, massaging her temples. Her body ached a little; she wondered if this was the precursor to some sort of illness.

There was a loud banging downstairs and she decided, illness or no illness, it was time to find out what was going on. The noise seemed to be coming from the back of the house. She threw on her dressing gown and hurried downstairs, only to find Mairleon following at her heels. Despite her fatigue, she managed a grin. “Bet I can get to the back door before you,” she teased. 

Richard’s eyes lit up. He tried to slip past her, but she kept her hand on the railing, blocking him. “Come now, play fair,” he admonished. 

Once they reached the bottom of the stairs, they each ran for it. Kim knew they’d catch it later from Mrs. Lowe, but didn’t care. A maid squeaked and backed into the kitchen as they raced past. Mairelon didn’t have robes tripping him up, but Kim didn’t play with honor—she grabbed hold of the back of his gown as he passed her and did her best to slow him down. He laughed, trying to swat her hand off, but couldn’t make her let go. As they rounded the corner she ducked past him. One of the butlers was at the back door, yelling at someone. Just before she could reach him, Mairelon grabbed her waist and neatly spun, setting her behind him as she squawked in protest. 

“If you’re going to cheat, then _I’m_ going to cheat,” he told her cheerfully. The butler had fallen silent and was now stiff with disapproval at their behavior. “What seems to be the problem?” Mairelon asked. 

The butler’s pudgy features glared. “This boy claims to have an urgent message for Miss Merrill,” he said icily. “I informed him that Miss Merrill was in repose and could not be disturbed.”

Kim looked round the bulk of the butler to see the boy they’d met in the market a few days ago. His face was clean and his shoes were better, but he was still obviously not up to the butler’s idea of respectable. 

When he saw Kim, his eyes lit up. “ _Please_ , Miss, I _got_ to talk to you!”

Kim tried to smooth her gowns, which were all twisted. “Well, all right, so talk, then.”

The boy scowled up at the fat butler. 

“Brickston, that will do,” Mairelon informed the butler. “Both Kim and I missed breakfast this morning; you can join us for whatever’s left over,” he told the boy. 

Brickston turned so red that Kim feared he might burst. “Sir, I’m afraid the silverware—”

“Will be fine,” Mairelon told him shortly. Brickston bowed very rigidly and left. Mairelon winked at Kim. “I do sometimes wonder what Brickston gets up to with the dishes when the rest of us aren’t looking. He seems inordinately overprotective of the spoons.” He led the others into the sitting room, empty as Mrs. Lowe had left to call on friends. 

Kim sat and called for tea and food, which was brought promptly. She poured their young guest a cup and offered him a roll with jam, which he snatched up and stuffed in his mouth as though he hadn’t eaten in days. 

“Mnph unf phenph,” the boy said, but Mairelon held a hand up. 

“When you’re finished, if you please. It’s considered impolite to give dire warnings when one has a mouth full of preserves,” Mairelon said. 

The boy ate quickly, looking all about the room with wide eyes. Kim doubted he’d ever seen such a place in his life—not during daytime, at any rate. He might have broken into a house or two in the dark, though, if he was the cracksman he claimed to be. 

“You should have some fruit,” Kim told him. “There’s apples on the sideboard.” She could remember being that hungry. She remembered it all too well. 

“I ain’t got time for that,” the boy insisted after he’d swallowed. “What I got to say is important.”

“Well, all right. But take a couple with you when you leave,” she urged. 

“This is _serious,_ ” the boy said with a frown. 

“Let’s start at the beginning, then,” Mairelon suggested. “What’s your name?”

The boy looked distracted. “Jem. Jeremy, but most call me Jem.”

“I’m Richard Merrill, and you know my fiancée, Kim.”

Jem nodded. “She told me her name. That’s how I tracked you down. And if I can do it, I bet _she_ can, too,” he added with a dark look. 

“She?” Kim echoed.

Mairelon held up a hand. “The _beginning_ , if you please.”

The boy nodded. “I was up at the Dog and Bull night before last. Just lookin’ about, sniffing round for work and all, you know. I had myself a pint and was right by the door, sizin’ the customers as they came in. Didn’t figure I’d find a good mark but you never know. So anyway, there I was, when this lady comes in. And she’s a real lady! At the Dog and Bull! She covered her face up good with a cloak and hood and all, so I didn’t see her, but it was a flash cloak and anyway, I heard her voice. She talked like a real gentry-mort you know?”

“What did she say?” Kim prompted. The whole thing was very odd. She just couldn’t imagine what the whole business had to do with them.

“Well, first off, she goes right to these men in the corner. She knew who she was lookin’ for, right enough. I ain’t seen them before, but they looked like a regular canting crew to me. So anyway, I sidled on over and took the chair in back of hers, because I could smell the money on her and I was hoping I’d get another chance to improve my dip, if you get my meaning. But then they started talking and I forgot all about that.”

“Why?”

“Cos they said your name! They was telling her she was late, and she said she hadn’t had a chance yet, and it was her lay anyhow and they should keep their mouths shut and be ready. And this skinny cove with the dark cap pulled low, he says they _been_ waitin’ and when are they gonna get paid? And she says they don’t get nothing until she has her revenge on Merrill. That’s what she said, right enough. ‘Revenge on Merrill.’” Jem looked at Kim and Richard, his chest puffed out as though he’d taken offense at this himself. “And they said it was takin’ too long and she said she couldn’t just waltz into a place like Grosvenor Square without a real good set up.”

“Interesting,” Mairelon murmured. 

“And you couldn’t see her face?” Kim asked. She felt like if she’d been a cat, her hair would be standing on end. This gentry-mort knew where they _lived?_

Jem shook his head. “She wore the hood low. I tried to get up and see her from another angle but she’d got herself in a corner and I couldn’t get a good look.”

“And you think she was a lady?” Mairelon asked. 

Jem looked uncertain at this. “Well, she got the right duds, and she sounded like a gentry-mort to me. Except—well . . . except she dressed them right down and knew all the words to do it right, too. They couldn’t gammon her; she was right knowing. They kept trying to get her to pay them up front, but she wouldn’t. She told them she had a plan to do something soon and they’d hear from her after that, and that’s flat. She wasn’t no widgeon.”

Mairelon frowned. “That’s certainly not much to go on.”

“Better to know there’s a wasp about than not to know anything at all,” Kim pointed out. 

“I suppose that’s true enough.” Mairelon sighed, steepling his fingers and touching them to his mouth as he thought. Kim could see straight away he was going to go into one of his brown studies. “A gentry-mort,” he mumbled.

“What have you got us into _now?_ ” Kim complained, exasperated. “And who’d you rile up this time?”

“I don’t know. I haven’t done anything whatever recently,” Mairelon pointed out. “Perhaps it’s an old slight. And it seems unfair to blame me now for an indiscretion of my wild youth. I could hardly know I’d one day meet you and turn respectable.” Mairelon gave her his most innocent look, and Kim snorted. 

“What are you going to do about it, that’s what I want to know?” Jeremy demanded. 

Richard’s eyes suddenly lit up, and he sat up very straight. “I know exactly what I’m going to do. I’m going to use Robert’s latest handiwork; he’s developed a spell to hear things that have happened in the past. That is—you haven’t changed your clothes recently, have you?”

Jem looked wildly discomfited. “Just the shoes I got off Tom, but—spell? You ain’t putting no spells on me!” He looked from Kim to Mairelon and back. “You didn’t tell me he was a frogmaker.”

“Well, so are we both,” Kim said lightly. 

“Cor! I never would have buzzed you _or_ him if I knew you could turn me into a toad!” He looked very worried now, clutching the arms of his chair, body tense like he might try to run. 

“It was foolish, but it’s done now. When you meddle with wizards you have a hard time untangling your affairs from theirs,” Mairelon told him with a small amount of amusement. 

Kim grinned. “You’d best settle now, and let Mairelon do what he needs. It won’t hurt much.”

Mairelon smiled impishly. “Oh, no. It will hardly hurt at all.”

“What?” Jem looked at him nervously. “What are you going to do to me? Are you going to magic me? What’ll it feel like?”

Mairelon looked at him very seriously as he only did when he was about to be especially outrageous. “What’ll it feel like? Well, have you ever held a red-hot coal? On your tongue?”

Jem went white, and Kim burst out laughing. “It’s all right,” she assured him. “We were just funning you. Don’t worry; we know what we’re doing. We got lots of experience.”

“And it won’t hurt a bit,” Mairelon promised. “Were you wearing your cap the night you met this mysterious lady?”

Jem nodded, freckles still standing out against his ashen face. 

“Just hand it to me. I’ll perform the spell on the cap and leave you out of it,” Mairelon explained. “Kim, get me a couple of candles. And all the silverware.” He took the grey, rather lopsided cap and set it on his plate. With the candles just so and the silverware arranged in a geometric formation around it, the spell was ready. Then Mairelon held a hand above the cap. “If this works, we ought to be able to hear any noises that happened in the cap’s vicinity.” Mairelon moved his hand counterclockwise over the hat, saying, “ _Vociferamini!_ ”

A muted sound began to infuse the room; to Kim it sounded like a group of people talking in another room. Mairelon frowned and curled his hand into a fist. The sounds continued, but wavered in and out. Eventually a woman’s voice could be heard, and Jem sat forward. 

“That’s her!” he whispered. He was on the edge of his seat, eyes round with wonder at this trick. 

But very little could be made out. Straining, Kim _did_ hear the word, “Merrill,” but the conversation was smothered, as though heard through a thick blanket. 

Eventually, Mairelon waved his hand, ending the spell. 

“That’s Robert’s new spell? It don’t half work,” Kim complained. 

“I don’t think it was the spell,” Mairelon said. He looked troubled. “It was all I could do to keep it going; I could feel my energy flagging.”

Kim felt a frisson of fear. It reminded her of last year and all they had been through, and Ma Yanger, and Mairelon, as depressed as she’d ever seen him. She hugged herself hard. “You mean you can’t do magic?”

“I could, but it was an effort. It was . . . like moving through clay.” Mairelon’s face was unreadable, but Kim would have bet anything he was remembering the same thing she had. His eyes were dark and distant. She hoped he wouldn’t go into another funk.

“What happened?” 

He sat back in his chair, eyes distant. “There are a few possibilities, but most likely it’s a . . . well. I suppose you might call it a parasite spell—a curse, really. What you do is, you can tap into someone else’s magical power, borrowing it. Usually if you’re careful about it, they won’t really notice. It can go on for years. But you must be very cautious, because if you overdo it you can kill the magician you’re stealing the magic from.”

“But how could they get your magic?” Kim asked. “You always have wards up.”

“It needn’t have happened here. I could have been walking about on the street.” Mairelon sighed. “Never mind; this isn’t getting us anywhere. Kim, I’ll need you to perform the spell.”

“Me?”

“We need to find out as much about this woman as we can. Obviously her plan is already moving forward. I’d like to see what more I can find out before she involves her little chums from the pub.”

“Oh, right.” Kim wondered what she needed a canting crew for; it seemed to her the woman had done enough damage already. “What do I got—have to do?”

“Switch places with me, first off,” Mairelon suggested. 

Kim did as she was told, then followed Mairelon’s instructions for casting the spell. To her puzzlement, this produced no sounds of conversation at all. Instead there was just a long, fading buzz like a bumblebee passing her by for a brighter flower. “What happened?” she said. 

Now Mairelon was very pale. “I was able to cast because I’ve years of experience and because you build up a . . . well, a magical stamina over years of practice. You haven’t. And it means I’m not the only wizard she’s hitched her wagon to,” he told Kim grimly. 

“Oh,” Kim said. She’d known it, of course, the moment the spell didn’t work, but she hadn’t wanted to believe it. To her surprise, she felt something close to panicked. Why should it upset her so? She’d gone her whole life without magic before meeting Mairelon, and it was more a chore than a game most times, anyway. Still, she felt just awful and—and wrong. It was like losing one of her senses. Kim felt helpless, and that made her angry. “What do we do now?” she demanded. 

“First, I suggest we figure out who’s behind this,” Mairelon suggested. 

“And then?”

“Then we ask her to return our magic.”

“Oh, really?” Kim said sarcastically. “And if she don’t, even if we ask as pretty as you like?”

“I’m sure we’ll think of something,” Mairelon said, some life returning to his eyes. “If she insists on being recalcitrant, I’ll threaten to set you on her.” Kim pulled a face at him as he gave her a lopsided smile. “Well, _I_ certainly wouldn’t be brave enough to face you in a temper.”

“You ain’t funny.”

“Nor am I joking,” Mairelon told her. “You’re a force to be reckoned with when you set your mind to it.” 

Kim couldn’t decide whether to be insulted or pleased by this. 

“What I want to know is, what to we do next?” Jeremy asked. 

“ _You_ will head back to that pub and keep your head down,” Mairelon told him. At the disappointment on the boy’s face, he added affably, “Don’t ask questions or draw attention to yourself, but keep your eyes and ears open. If you should see one of the conspirators again, send word immediately.” 

Jem sat up and nodded hard. Kim wouldn’t have been surprised if he’d saluted. “You can count on me,” he swore.

“We’re in the devil’s own scrape,” Kim commented unhappily. “Again! And it was just a couple of weeks ago you got us kidnapped.” She glared at Mairelon.

He gave her his most winning smile in return. “Then it’s high time we got ourselves embroiled in another scandal,” he replied. “Otherwise people will think we’re losing our touch. We’ve got our reputations to consider, you know.”

“We certainly do,” Kim said sourly. How were they going to get out of a scrape like this? What could they do without magic? They could ask Lady Wendall to help, but she was at Russell Square for a few days and anyway, the idea of having someone else—even Mairelon’s mother—know that she and Mairelon were helpless just didn’t sit right with Kim. “What can we do?” she wondered. 

Mairelon was, as ever, unruffled. “We try to figure out who would do such a thing, and why. I’ll make a list of every person I’ve ever, er, inconvenienced, and then we’ll try to find out where they are now.”

Kim groaned in dismay. “That’ll take _ages_ ,” she told him. 

Mairelon grinned, not put off in the least. “Then we’d best get started.”

oOoOoOo

“That’s more than thirty people, by my count,” Kim said, agog at the list. She felt the two likeliest were Miss Gilmore or Lady Clotsworthy, but Mairelon didn’t feel either of them were serious contenders. They’d sent Jem off with a small fortune by his measure, and then they’d retired to the library to make the list.

Mairelon, resting his chin in his hand as he sat at his desk, frowned hard. “Well, at least very few of them are women.”

Kim kept pacing, nettled. “And that’s supposed to make me feel better, is it?”

“It narrows things down, at any rate.”

“Really? Because she could be someone’s sister or daughter or wife or something,” Kim pointed out. She stopped and stared over Mairelon’s shoulder at the names scrawled in his careless handwriting. She glanced at him and watched the chagrin wash over his face. 

“It does seem to me that you derive an indecent satisfaction from thinking things through when I haven’t,” he complained.

Kim laughed and allowed herself to be overcome by the urge to lean over and press a kiss to his dark head. He looked up at her in surprise, then smiled brilliantly. He reached out and Kim yelped as he slipped an arm round her and tugged her into his lap. She punched him lightly in the arm. “You talk about indecent,” she said after he’d kissed her thoroughly. “What would happen if one of the servants walked in right now?” 

“They’d enjoy gossiping amongst themselves for weeks,” Mairelon replied without shame. 

“You’re incorrigible,” she replied. She kissed him back, hard, carding her fingers through his hair. 

“A year ago you would have called me cork-brained,” he said when she pulled away. “Does that mean I’ve risen in your esteem or merely that your vocabulary has expanded?”

“You’re still cork-brained,” she assured him, arching an eyebrow. “It’s just that you’re incorrigible, too.” 

There was a knock on the door and Kim stood up quickly, trying to make sure her dress looked right and she wasn’t in too much disarray. “Who is it?”

“It’s me.” Hunch came in, looking worried. “You wanted me?” he said to Mairelon.

Mairelon handed him the list. “What do you remember of these?”

Frowning and chewing the ends of his mustache, Hunch went down the list. “Well . . . Henry Abbott, he was that cove who tried to cheat you at cards. Had a right tantrum and I had to throw ’im out in the street. Barnaby Stocks, that was Halifax, that was years ago. He tried to pass that old nag off on you, as I recall. Marie Garnier! That was in France; she popped her clogs just after we left.”

“Did she? What a pity; she truly disliked me,” Mairelon said with a distracted air. Kim had to hide a smile at that. 

“What’s this all about, Master Richard?” Hunch asked.

“An unfortunate situation has arisen and I find myself in need of an enemy.”

“Spoiled for choice, then,” Hunch said sourly. 

“Hah, yes. But in this particular instance, I have it on good authority that my enemy is _female._ A high born woman. Can you think of anyone I’ve annoyed fitting that description?”

“Hmph; most of ’em as you’ve encountered,” Hunch muttered. The manservant gave this some thought. More loudly he added, “Well, Lord Edwards had a sister; you didn’t much get on when you were younger.”

“Susanna Edwards?” Mairelon repeated, startled. “I spilled cocoa on her best dress. We were eight. She can’t be holding a grudge over _that_ , can she?”

“There’s Lady Noyes-Carrington,” Hunch offered helpfully. “You insulted ’er lineage at that party after she got all uppish at you.”

“I didn’t insult her lineage. She asked me how I could call a ‘dirty street thief’ like Kim ‘dearest,’ and said she could never imagine lowering herself so.”

“And you replied, ‘And what would you call a man who’d embezzled ten thousand pounds from the bank? Ah, that’s right, you call him _father’_ ,” Kim put in with a wry grin. 

“I said it _very sweetly_ ,” Mairelon replied. “At any rate, she may have considered it something of an atrocious social faux pas, but I doubt Lady Noyes-Carrington found it a hanging offense.”

“I dunno,” Kim said, picturing the bracket-faced old cat. “For a minute she sure looked like she could have cheerfully killed you.”

“Nonsense. Lady Noyes-Carrington is not capable of doing anything cheerfully,” Mairelon replied tartly. 

Kim nearly choked. 

“Well, there’s nothing for it,” Mairelon said with a sigh. “Hunch, bring the carriage around.”

“Where are we going?” Kim demanded.

“To be sociable. First we’ll speak with Renée; she’ll know whether your Miss Gilmore is a viable candidate.”

“ _My_ Miss Gilmore?” Kim squawked. 

Mairelon’s eyes laughed at her. “You certainly couldn’t call her mine,” he said. “Which may or may not be the heart of our issue.” He gave an uncomfortable shrug. “She’ll also have thoughts on Lady Clotsworthy and any other high born ladies I might have offended. Then we’ll head to the Ministry to visit Shoreham. You may not have realized, since I’m very good at hiding it, but I tend not to notice when I’ve irritated someone.” Kim had to agree with that. “Shoreham’s the one who sent me on most of my assignments; I’m sure he’ll know if any have relations who would wish me ill, and whether anyone made complaints to the Ministry. Perhaps he’ll have a lead.”

Kim shrugged. “Good a plan as any,” she agreed.

oOoOoOo

“Well, that was a singularly dull exercise in futility,” Mairelon commented as they returned to the carriage after visiting Lord Shoreham.

“So from Renée D’Auber, we know that Gilmore and Codswallop are out,” Kim said.

“Clotsworthy,” Mairelon corrected with a thin smile. Renée had come up with one possible suspect, but as it turned out, the woman had left England, so she was definitely out. The French wizard had also pooh-poohed the notion of Julia Gilmore; she was married to her art and going to be quite famous for it someday. She might still be a bit miffed at Mairelon, but she wasn’t the sort to hurt someone; she expressed it on canvas. And Renée had merely laughed at the idea of Clotsworthy managing such a scheme.

“Whatever. From Shoreham, well . . .” Shoreham had suggested any female he could think of, which wasn’t much, and most were in no position to do the deed. Kim ticked off the remaining suspects on her fingers. “One woman in prison, one hempen-widow sick as a cushion—she’s like not up for it—one daughter of a man you put in Luds Balwark, but she ain’t even old enough to walk, and one woman, as it turns out, dead of consumption. And us back where we started,” she concluded glumly. 

“Yes.” 

She kept a close eye on Mairelon as they got into the carriage and started home, but he was very mum. _I bet he’s going to be in a dudgeon,_ she thought fretfully. Magic meant more to him than it did to her; she knew the situation was wearing him down. It was affecting her as well, both body and mind. The theft of their magic had left them both feeling like they had a rather nasty cold in the head. 

“Maybe we’re taking this from the wrong direction,” Kim said suddenly. Mairelon looked up tiredly. Kim felt a pang. She hated to see him so, and her helpless to do anything.

“How do you mean?” he asked. 

“Instead of tracking down this mort, let’s find the blokes she hired. Like as not _someone_ at the pub knows them.”

Mairelon perked up. “There’s an idea.” He promptly leaned out and told the driver to change directions. 

“What, we’re going there _now?_ ” Kim looked down at her good dress in dismay. “I should change first.”

“We don’t want to give this mystery woman more time to implement the remainder of her plan,” Mairelon reminded her. Kim sighed, but she couldn’t argue. “Quite so,” Mairelon said with a smile, seeing the look on her face.

The rode in silence for a while before Mairelon cleared his throat. “Kim, there is something I haven’t told you.”

Kim looked up in alarm. “What is it?” she asked warily. 

“I was hoping I’d know more about our mystery woman before I brought it up, but as we’re no further along than we were . . . you see, the return of our magic really depends upon the person stealing it.” Mairelon looked down at his hands.

“What do you mean?” 

“One would assume that to steal another person’s magic, well, the person doing so would have to be a magician, and that’s a reasonable enough assumption. If that’s the case, then it will be very easy, once we confront the woman, for me to reverse the spell. But as you know, there are ways for people who are not wizards to acquire spells and potions from others who do have that talent.”

“Right. Like the _obelios._ Anyone can use one.”

“Exactly. And if our woman had a spell commissioned for her use, it . . . complicates matters.”

“How so?”

“Because the woman wouldn’t really be able to use our magic. She’d have to store it. If she has no magical ability herself, no aptitude, then she cannot tap into what she’s stealing. It seems a silly concern, because I cannot imagine why anyone would leech magical power if not to use it, but if she wishes to affect some sort of vengeance—possibly the magic itself is of no matter to her.”

“All right,” Kim said slowly. “So what’s the trouble?”

“The trouble is that, if she is having to store it, our magic is very vulnerable. The only thing she could possibly do with it at that point is to infuse it into something else. And if something should happen to that object . . .”

Kim raised her eyebrows in question.

“It would not be pretty,” Mairelon told her shortly. 

“What sort of object?”

“It could be anything at all. All I can guess is that she would keep it close; she wouldn’t want anyone else to get hold of it.”

“All right.” Kim sat back, considerably less at ease than she had been before, and mentally urged Hunch to drive faster.

The Dog and Bull was everything Kim remembered—seedy, smelly, and dim. Jeremy was seated at the far end of the back table, and he sat up with a start when he saw them. He quickly got to his feet and hurried over. “What are you lot doing here? And in gentry togs! You look as out of place as a duchess in the stews!”

Mairelon glanced down at himself. “We were in a hurry.”

“You’re dicked in the nob, both of you!” Jem chastised, trying to keep his voice down. 

Kim winced. Jem was right; they should have thought it through. What was the matter with her? She was getting to be as impulsive as Mairelon. She was supposed to be the smart one. Well, the one with common sense, at any rate. “You’re right; we should of considered,” she told Jem, who shook his head despairingly. No doubt he now felt that he’d have to see they didn’t come to harm.

“What did these men look like, again?” Mairelon asked him. He led him to a table and sat him down. It was still early; the pub was still mostly empty. The men who were there eyed Kim and Mairelon with a mixture of distrust and greed. She hoped they wouldn’t be robbed. 

“Well, one was bluff and he kept his head close-shaved. He looked like a captain-hakum, real tough; he didn’t say a word. Then there was another in a greasy coat. Couldn’t tell you anything about him other than he was carroty-pated. The one that did the most talking, I couldn’t get a good look at him because of his cap, and also he had his collar turned up. But he was skinny.”

“Were they young men?” Mairelon asked.

Jem considered this. “I dunno about the one with red hair. But the big one was older, and the fly cove that did all the talkin’, I couldn’t guess.” 

Kim frowned. “It’s not a lot to go on in here,” she said. “It’d probably be easiest to find the red-head or the bruiser,” she suggested. 

Jem scoffed. “’Ow many bruisers you think come in here? It’s practically all they got.”

“But a man with red hair—in conjunction with a tough, close-shaven man—perhaps that might draw a lead?” Mairelon put in. 

Kim noticed a man sitting near them was listening closely. “Clear off, cully,” she warned him. “Or we’ll bring our man in and set him on you.”

He blinked, then got up and left. 

“That was good. Though I ought to point out that Hunch wouldn’t be desirous of coming in and starting a brawl with these fellows,” Mairelon told her in an undertone. 

“It don’t matter. It’s the look of the thing and how you say it.”

Mairelon glanced about. “We could offer a reward.”

“No good. Don’t want ’em knowing you’ve got money, trust me,” Kim told him. 

“Then we’re right back where we’ve started. It’s no good. I’ll have to contact Mother. A quick search-and-trace from here may give us a lead,” Mairelon said.

Kim coughed. She leaned forward across the table incredulously. “You’re going to bring your mother to _the Dog and Bull?_ ”

“Well . . . yes, I see your point. Perhaps Shoreham—”

“Begging your pardon, Guv, did I hear tell right? There’s a rumor that you’re looking for a ginger pated lad . . . and that there might be a small reward.”

Kim turned to find a man with a cap in his hand smiling at them. The bristles on his chin were salt and pepper, but the rest of his hair was dark and he looked strapping for his age, which she’d place at fifty. “Who’s askin’?” she demanded.

“Where are my manners?” The man gave her a darkly ironic smile. “Name’s Ned. Ned Smith. And I got to tell you, I know a man with red hair. Been talkin’ about the fine gentry folk he knows, too. So when I hear about you I think, Neddy, there’s some people lookin’ for their friend. Surely they would not take it amiss if I were to offer my assistance?”

Mairelon and Kim exchanged a glance. “He keeps the company of gentlemen, does he?”

“Oh, quite. Or in his case, should I say, a gentlewoman?”

Mairelon sat up straight and Kim cursed mentally. This cove was as trustworthy as a fox and just as like to bite. “And you can tell us where to find this man, can you?”

“Oh, aye. You can see his lodgings from the back step. I’ll happily point your way—for a small fee.”

“And you’d want this ‘small fee’ up front, I’d guess,” Kim drawled.

“It would help. My missus has been ill, see, and here’s me with four little ones to feed.” He twisted the cap back and forth in his hands and looked at her anxiously. 

She exchanged a quick glance with Mairelon. He made just the slightest shrug; he was going to leave it up to her. She looked at Jem, who glowered. He did not trust the sharper any more than Kim did. 

“And you’ll take us to him, then?”

“Oh, I daren’t, miss. He has a fine temper on ‘im. In fact, I’d be glad if you didn’t let on as it was me what told you about him.”

“Oh.” That actually made things a bit better; she wasn’t going anywhere with this cull. Her senses were screaming that his pitch was queer and she knew better than to listen to it. Still, it might make it worse to say no. That might make him angry and he could set upon them. She didn’t want to cause a scene. “Give you a bender for the information,” she offered grudgingly. 

He looked momentarily outraged. “A bender!?”

“It ain’t like you’re even actually showin’ us. Like as not you’ll just point out some random flash house or even point us down an alley where your mob’s waitin’ for us, with oaken towels to crack us with, I bet. Give over. We ain’t gudgeons.”

The man looked at her with a slack jaw. Slowly he shut his mouth, and an expression of anger slowly washed over his face. “No, you ain’t,” he said. “You’re as knowin’ as I ever saw.” He thought things over. “I ain’t taking less than three shillings,” he said. “But I’ll take you to him.”

Kim had proved her point, but she couldn’t let him think she was too soft. “I ain’t had a drink since I been in here; don’t know why you think I’m bosky. I ain’t never offerin’ that much. One shilling.”

“Done,” he said. “I can take you right to his doorstep. Follow me.” He got up and headed for the back door.

Kim leaned over to Mairelon. “We ain’t followin’ that cove anywhere,” she told him with feeling. 

“I think he might be one of the crew,” Jem added softly. 

“We’ll follow as far as the alley, then we pike off around to the front and get Hunch,” Kim said.

Mairelon heaved a sigh. “As you like, but I can’t help but feel like we’ve rather wasted this whole day.”

Kim felt bad, but she was still too edgy to worry over him. She followed him out the back door into the alley. 

The cudgel swung out of the darkness and Mairelon fell to his knees before Kim could even cry out. Then a beefy arm snagged her from behind—from behind! And a hamhock-hand clapped over her mouth. She bit down hard and the hand immediately retreated. 

“The little scab bit me!” 

“Grab ‘er!” 

“Listen ’ere, girl; you behave and your gentry-cove won’t catch it, you understand?”

Kim looked into the face of the man with the grey bristles on his chin, and then she screamed as loud as she could. Another hand was hastily clapped over her mouth. If Hunch hadn’t heard that, he was deaf as a post. 

“Get ’er in the hackney! Get ’em all in!” Kim saw them roughly jerking Mairelon to his feet. He was rubbing the back of his head, but the fact that he was awake to do so was something of a relief. 

“Shit! Frank, you’ve made a mull of it again. She told us not to grab ’em!”

Frank, who was apparently the man who’d tricked them in the pub, had grabbed Jem and was trying to wrestle him into a waiting hackney. “She didn’t. She didn’t! She just said not to do anything afore she was ready.”

The man with the red hair stamped in frustration. “Kidnappin’ ’em counts as doing something, right enough!”

“I don’t give a tinker’s damn,” Frank told him with a dark look. “You answer to me and you do as you’re told.” 

The redhead glowered, but went and grabbed a bag and came over to Kim, seizing her wrists. Kim kicked out at him hard, knocking his shin, and he yelped. Angry, he tried to kick her back, but with the man holding her from behind it was easy to put all her weight on him and hold both legs off the ground. This caused the redhead to miss Kim completely and kick the man behind her instead. 

“Ow! Look out, you bastard, or I’ll lay you like a monkey!”

The red haired man went pale. “I was aiming at the girl,” he swore. “’Old her still and it won’t happen.”

The man holding Kim pinned her arms, so she stomped down hard on his insole and he nearly turned her loose. But just as she got free she ran smack into the redhead, sending them both to the ground. The bruiser who’d been holding Kim was so angry that he came over and tried to stomp on her just as the redhead reached out, and he ended up stamping his big boot down right on top of the redhead’s hand. The red haired man screamed. 

Kim rolled over and tried to get to her feet. The big man grabbed her hair. “You stop that, or I’m going to go over and give your toff a basting.” Kim stopped struggling. “Now you be a good girl and let ’im put these on you.”

“Grappling irons!?” cried Kim in disbelief. _What sort of bacon-brained numbscull would use fetters on the likes of me?_ she wondered. Either they didn’t think much of her, or they weren’t professionals. They didn’t even try to do them behind her back! They left them right out in front! _Maybe it’s a courtesy they’re affording me because I’m a woman?_ But no, then he went on to Jem and did the same thing. 

Kim and Jem shared a look of complete disgust. That actually made Kim feel a bit better; it was clear Jem was no flat. Then they got the irons on Mairelon and shoved them all toward the hackney. 

“It’s a mug’s game,” the redhead complained. “And she ain’t going to be happy.”

“Look, look,” Frank told him. “We’re showin’ initiative,” he said in a wheedling tone. “We’re showin’ some spirit. We’re solvin’ problems for her. We’ll ask extra for that. Anyway, what else could we do? They were askin’ about us. They knew what you and Toady looked like. They’re flush, I can tell. They’d have been to the Runners and then we’d be in trouble.”

“We’re already in trouble,” the skinny bloke said. “I say we top ’em now, afore this gets out of hand.”

“Don’t be buffle-headed! Then we wouldn’t get anything! The gentry-mort’s lay depends on ’em bein’ alive. We’ll take ’em to her and let her decide what to do. Sydney, you ride in here with them, make sure they don’t make no noise or anything. I’ll ride coach with Toady.” 

Sydney, the red haired man, shoved Jem into the coach. “You, now,” he told Mairelon. Kim expected Mairelon to object or suddenly come up with something clever, but he looked meek and got in without complaining. Kim was instantly suspicious. She’d known him well enough to tell when he got one of his queer starts. She hoped he wasn’t going to get them all killed. 

Then Sydney turned to her, and she scrambled into the hackney to avoid him ‘helping’ by touching her in any way. She ended up next to Mairelon; the redheaded Sydney slipped in across from her. He thumped on the roof. “Go!” he said, and the hackney creaked its way down and out of the alley. 

Kim looked at Mairelon. There was a trickle of blood from the crown of his head, but his eyes looked clear and bright. Still, she didn’t want him getting hurt again. From here on out, this would be her lay.

As they rattled along the cobblestones, Jem gave Sydney a defiant glare. “Should we gang up on ’im?” he asked. “We got good odds an’ I’m game an’ all.” 

“Shut up, you!” Sydney cuffed him upside the head, hard. 

“If you know what’s good for you, nodcock, you’ll keep your fambles off him or I’ll let our your puddings,” Kim snarled. 

“Yeah? How?” Sydney asked with a mocking sneer. “You goin’ to claw me open with your fingernails?” 

Kim looked sidelong at Mairelon. 

He let out a long breath. “There’s no need to jump them yet. I think we’re fine just as we are.”

“Oh, you do, do you?” said Sydney, amused. 

Mairelon ignored him. He brushed off his coat a little, getting some of the dust out. “Well, you are taking us where we want to go,” he said reasonably. 

Sydney looked suspicious. “’Ow’s that, then?”

Mairelon only shrugged and gave him a good-humored smile, but Kim froze. He was _right;_ they hadn’t any way to get their fobs on this gentry-mort, and now they were being taken directly to her. They might not be sitting pretty, but they were still getting where they wanted to go. Mairelon saw the expression on her face. “Just so,” he said smugly. 

“Well, all right,” she murmured. “But this is my lay now, you understand?” 

He raised his eyebrows. 

“You’re hurt, like, and anyways I got more experience with this sort of thing. I’m doin’ this my way and you got to agree not to queer it for me.” She looked fiercely at him, and he got an odd, soft sort of smile. 

Mairelon nodded. “I promise. I won’t get in your way.”

“Good.”

Sydney looked contemptuous. “Hark at ’em, making grand plans. You two stow it or I’ll put you both to bed with a shovel, you hear me?”

Kim scowled at him. 

“I didn’t sign on for this,” he muttered. Kim could see that he was sweating. “She told us it’d be easy once she got your magic. She didn’t say nothin’ about any romps who could fight like men and knew our cant.”

Good, she thought callously. _Let ’im worry over what he’s got coming to him, because it’s going to be worse than he guesses._ She looked disdainfully at the irons on her wrists. 

As they drove along, Sydney looked at Kim. “You know, for a tomboy, you are a rum-doxy,” he murmured. He bit his lip as if deciding something, then stood.

“You’d best sit down; the ride may be bumpier than you realize,” Mairelon said quietly. Kim recognized his tone; the mildness was meant to cover over when he was really angry. She shot him a quelling look.

“What do you want, then?” she asked Sydney.

He loomed over her, then hesitated. At first Kim thought he was thinking better of the whole thing, which would be the first smart thing he’d done. But no, from that vantage point he had a good look at Kim’s figure, and the look that crept over his face made her shudder. Just her luck he was even stupider than she’d imagined. Well, it would only make things easier in the end. She could feel Mairelon next to her go very tense; she hoped he wouldn’t be such a flat that he’d queer things. But he didn’t move. Kim herself stayed very still. She waited until he leaned down. “You know, a little bit of two handed put and I might be a lot nicer to you.”

Kim gave him a brittle smile. “Come here, then,” she said. He must not have noticed how cold her voice was, because he bent over anyway, which was just bang up, in her view. When he was close enough, Kim heaved the handcuffs, clipping him under the chin. He topped backwards without a sound. 

“Glory be,” breathed Jem, his eyes wide and shining. “You sure took the wind out of his sails, right enough.” He leaned over the man. “He’s still breathing, though,” he added, almost sounding disappointed. 

“Glory be indeed,” muttered Mairelon. “That was . . . impressive.”

Kim sniffed. “Not hardly. Everyone knows darbies make better weapons than restraints, so long as you’re strong. They weigh enough for it. Jem was right; if we wanted to set on him we could have beat ’im to death before you could say Jack Robinson.”

Mairelon looked down at his own handcuffs thoughtfully. “I expected you to pick the locks.”

“Well, that comes next.” She reached up and worked her hatpin loose. Within moments, she was free. 

“That was quick work.” The hackney stopped.

“Are we going to bust out now?” Jem asked. 

Kim frowned. “Better to bottleneck ’em in the doorway, so they have to come at us one at a time,” she said. She handed the pin to Jem. “Here. Get yourself loose and then do Mairelon.” She positioned herself next to the door of the hackney, holding the handcuffs in one fist. The gang were loobies to have used ’em—they were the finest knuckle-dusters you could ask for. 

Soon enough, the door opened and Toady, the burly man, stood before her. She struck quickly, but he moved a little so she just grazed his jaw. Eyes nearly red with rage, he reached out with one great paw and yanked her out. 

“Kim!” she heard Mairelon cry. 

The man punched her, knocking her to the ground, but she struggled back up onto her feet, ignoring her aching ribs. “Stay out of it!” she shouted. He’d already had one blow to the head; another might kill him. She took a couple of deep breaths and glared at the bluff man. “That’s all right,” she grunted. She squared herself and looked him in the eye. “I’m ready to sport my canvas; come on, then.” As he rushed her, she dropped and scrambled between his legs. 

“Watch him!” she heard Jem bellow. He and Mairelon had tumbled out of the hackney, free from their restraints. 

“You stay out of this,” she ordered. She sized her opponent up. He was big and had greater reach—that would be an advantage to him. She had the irons; that would help her. She had been in many fights in her days on the streets. Bonny Bill O’Rourke, a tough who would teach any boy how to box in exchange for a pint of ale, had once told her that boys shook hands with a closed fist. It was true—Kim’s closest friends had all been boys she had knocked down (or been knocked down by). She reckoned you had to test someone so as to find out if he’d have your back. 

Toady made another swing, and Kim danced back out of his reach. The only thing a smaller man could do was to wear the bigger out and look for an opening. The more time she spent dodging, the better. They circled each other like wolves. 

“You’re gonna get hurt,” Toady said with a mean smile. She couldn’t tell if this was a warning or a promise. 

“I’ll give as good as I get,” she said. He promptly stepped up and popped her in the face and she sat down hard. A little stunned, she pressed her hand to her mouth. A little blood, but no loose teeth or anything. “That’s as best you can do?” 

He looked surprised and came at her again, but she was ready, and rolled away. On her way up, she sent a knee to his gut. She could hear him grunt in pain, but ignored this. She kicked him behind the knee, sending him to the ground. This presented an opportunity to get the foot in a few times, which she did. She wasn’t choosy about where she put it, either—she’d been raised to take the advantage wherever she could find it, and no apologies afterward. 

Toady managed to grab her ankle and shove her back. But he took his time getting up and that was fine by Kim; she used this opportunity to use the irons to give him a good ding round the ear. She followed that up with a punch to his jaw. She thought she might have growled a little; she had to admit, it was a rush to have a match like this.

“That’s it! Oh, that was a beauty! Put a facer on him!” Mairelon shouted, to her bemusement. 

“’It’s _land_ a facer,” Jem corrected gleefully. 

“I stand corrected.”

Toady stumbled hard, but still staggered to his feet. He was a game one, she had to admit. Still and all, he wasn’t really a fighter; she’d have bet good coin he didn’t come up on the streets. He glowered down at her and made a fist. 

The next blow hurt, it really did. She didn’t quite go down, but it wouldn’t take many more like it before she did. He didn’t have to be trained at it; he was powerful and all he needed was another lucky punch. 

“Go on, then!” she heard Jem shout. As she glanced at him he roared, “Draw his cork!” He then made a gesture—a signal anyone in her crew would have recognized—and she nodded. 

She circled about, getting her position right. 

“Come ’ere, you,” Toady grunted. “I’ll tip you a stoter so pretty you won’t get up again!” 

“YOU JUST TRY IT, YOU GREAT CLUNCH!” Kim hollered, urging him on. She just barely dodged his fist—it caught her in the shoulder and spun her around. She had to do some quick footwork to set herself right again. Before he could land another blow, she dropped to squat low and rushed him. She rammed her shoulder into his stomach as hard as she could, knocking his breath out; meanwhile, Jem had dropped to his hands and knees behind Toady, who tripped over him and went down hard. 

Kim leapt on the man with a wordless roar, hitting him with the handcuffs again and again. She mostly hit his forearms, which he held up in self-defense, but her rage was unflagging. Jem put the boot in a few times as well. Finally Toady managed to push Kim off and get to his feet. 

He’d have had a good shot just then—she was helpless on the ground—but he did something that took her by surprise; he turned coward. “Blow this for a lark, I’m going back to tailoring,” she heard him grunt. He had a great gash on his head from the fall on the cobblestones. “She said it’d be easy with no magic," he panted. "She never said nothin’ bout no milling tomboy who fights like a wildcat.” He took to his heels and Kim stared after him in shock. 

“Well _done_ ,” Mairelon said. 

“Yes, well done, you,” another voice put in, but this one sounded sarcastic. Kim looked up to see the leader of the crew, the older man with the scruff. “I didn’t expect you to come out ahead of Toady, that’s sure, but it don’t matter.” 

Kim faced him with all the haughty braggadocio she could muster. “I’m used to milling with blokes that can fight, not dainty cock robins the likes o’ you,” she told him. 

“I don’t have to display to advantage,” the cull told her. “I’m the one with the pistol.” 

Kim looked closer and saw that it was true; he had a gun aimed square at her. Her lips thinned. She heard Mairelon draw in a sharp breath and she motioned for him to stay still. 

“You’d best fall in line now, ‘cos I’ve got the bull dog and you ain’t got nothing, including magic,” the man told her. 

For a moment, Kim was at a loss, but at the word ‘magic’ she felt as if her head lit up. “If you think that, you’ve been gammoned,” Kim told him.

He laughed. “I ain’t no flat. If you’d of had magic, you’d of used it by now.”

Kim reached into her skirt and felt the reassuring bit of paper concealed there. “You sure?”

“Dead sure,” he said, but he looked less certain. “Otherwise why’d you let Toady give you a souse across the chops?”

“I don’t pike off at the first sign of trouble,” Kim told him. “And anyway, I've been hit harder than that before.”

“You’re gammoning me. If you’re a real frogmaker, prove it!” 

Quickly, Kim drew the paper from the folds of her skirt and crumpled it in her fist; a great fiery sphere burst from her hand and roared toward the man. 

With a shout, he leapt out of the way, dropping his gun. Mairelon rushed over to scoop it up, but the man was legging it away down the alley. Kim hurried over. Mairelon turned to her anxiously. “Are you all right?” 

Grinning, she reached up and pulled him down into a kiss. “Better now,” she said. 

He looked at her for a long moment with a crooked smile. There was a funny look in his eye, almost like he’d been dazzled. Then he swept her into his arms and kissed her back. “You don’t half know how to fight,” he said breathlessly. 

Kim drew back, speechless. 

“It was rather exciting,” Mairelon explained, a little red. 

Kim grinned. “If I’d of thought it’d get you in a romantic mood, I’d hit people a lot more often,” she finally said. If that was flirting, she was confident in her skills and wouldn’t mind it one bit. Anyway, she liked fighting. Fighting and then kissing Mairelon was better than magic, even.

“Oh, really?” he murmured, face close to hers. To her experience, Richard Merrill did not leer, but she would be hard pressed to come up with another term for it.

She laughed softly. “I could stand to have a good scrap now and then.” She glanced around the empty alley scornfully. “Not that I’d have called this a good scrap,” she added dryly. 

Mairelon raised his eyebrows. “Indeed?”

She wiggled a hand. “I’d give ’em three out of five, at best,” she scoffed. 

“Are you lot going to stand there all day making cow eyes at each other?” Jem demanded. 

Kim hastily pushed Mairelon away and tried to make herself look more like the presentable lady she was supposed to be. She suspected this was hopeless; her skirts were torn and dirty and she’d lost her hat. When she saw it on the cobblestones she made sure to accidentally tread on it, hard. That would show those loathsome grapes. “Well, and what about you?” she said. “I told you to stay out of it; don’t pretend you didn’t hear me, either.” 

Jem looked at Mairelon, who turned his expression to something suitably angelic enough to make Kim suspicious. “So?” Jem said. “’ _E_ might of made you a promise, but I didn’t promise nothing.”

Mairelon cleared his throat as she turned her scowl on him. “Don’t look at me. I’m as innocent as a child. Well. I’m at _least_ as innocent as _that_ child,” he said, nodding to Jem.

Kim looked back and forth between the two of them. “Oh, I _see,_ ” she said dryly. It was just like Mairelon to meddle. He probably thought it didn’t count if he only hinted to Jem what he ought to do. Well, she’d give him a good trimming later.

Jem planted his hands on his hips. “There’s still the gentry-mort to deal with,” he pointed out. “You ain’t done yet.”

Mairelon smiled. “No, nor are you,” he said. “You run and fetch us a Runner. We want to be ready if those men come back.”

“What about you?” Jem said, looking worried. He stood there with his curly hair all about his head, shining under the street lamp like a halo. 

Mairelon beamed at him. “We’re just going to go and set things right,” he promised. “It will only take a moment.”

“You hope,” Kim muttered.

oOoOoOo

It took Kim a little while to pick the lock on the back of the house. The fixture was surprisingly difficult. Finally, she heard the slight click and eased the door open a crack. 

“Do you see anyone?” Mairelon whispered. 

Kim chewed her lip gently. “No. And it ain’t right. Where are all the servants?”

“You think it’s a trap?”

“That’s as may be,” she acknowledged. “But I think we’ll have to risk it. I don’t think the Runners will be all right with just lettin’ us bust into someone’s house, and us not even knowin’ exactly who that someone is.”

“You may be right,” Mairelon breathed. “Here, let me go first.”

“Who is the expert cracksman around here?” Kim replied, affronted.

“Who happens to be holding the pistol?” Mairelon responded with a sunny smile.

“You could give me the pistol and I’ll go ahead,” Kim suggested. 

“I think you’ve taken enough risks for one day.” Mairelon didn’t wait for her response this time—he snaked around her into the darkened hallway. She had to hand it to him; he didn’t half move like a Bowman-Prigg.

There were some lights in the house, but not as many as Kim would have expected. In all, the place had an air of having been abandoned. And it wasn’t a real gentry-mort’s house, anyway. It was small and the furnishings were somewhat sparse, though here and there she’d see a rather pretty candlestick or a nice painting. It was all rather haphazard, though; Kim suspected this was someone who aped Quality, and wasn’t born to it. Still, she didn’t expect the place to be empty.

“Where is everyone?” Kim whispered. 

“I hear voices in the drawing room.” They crept down the hall as noiselessly as cats and stopped outside a shut door. 

“I’m tellin’ you, Missus, I ’ _eard_ it, I did! And I _saw_ it! It was a great gout of fire like nowt you’ve ever seen! They come for us, Missus, and _they was riding a dragon!_ ”

Mairelon snorted in amusement, and Kim gave him a sharp elbow to the ribs. What did he think he was playing at? This wasn’t no time to be careless. 

“Susan, you are a _stupid girl_ ,” an icy voice replied. “Dragons indeed!”

“I swear on me mum’s grave! They flew up on a dragon and told it to thrash Toad and it did and then it spit fire at Frankie! My Frankie! It looked like this, Missus!” Apparently Susan’s expert pantomime of her mostly-imaginary dragon failed to impress. 

“Susan! Stop making that face _at once!_ ” the other woman’s voice ordered. “I swear, if I’d only had _real_ money, I’d have ordered myself a real Abigail instead of surrounding myself with fools and cretins and incompetents.”

Susan, however, was not budging on this point. “They magicked a dragon,” she insisted, “out of thin air. I saw it, and you can’t tell me what I did and didn’t see. It had eyes like coals afire and a mouth like a great furnace, with blackened teeth like fire grates! And _it spoke,_ Missus!”

The lady heaved a sigh. “And what did it say, Susan? High yourself up to Bedlam? That’s what it should’ve said.” 

“It said, _you just try it, you great clunch!_ ” Susan repeated with a reverence that was entirely unwarranted. 

“What an interesting vocabulary that dragon has,” Mairelon murmured, and Kim nudged him hard in the ribs. 

“And even though it was a monstrous, scaly thing with pokers for paws, it spoke in the voice of _a woman!_ ” Susan ended dramatically. 

There was a long pause. “A woman?”

“Oh, _aye,_ Missus, a real flash-mort.” 

Kim leaned forward, pressed against Mairelon. Unfortunately, this caused the floorboards to shift and give a loud creak.

“Who’s there?” a cold voice promptly demanded.

“I think that’s our cue,” Mairelon muttered. “Enter magician and ward-cum-fiancée, stage left.” He strode forward and pushed open the door, brandishing the pistol. 

The Abigail shrieked with fear and managed to upend a glass of wine, spilling it all over in her fright. 

“ _Really,_ Susan,” the woman scolded. 

“I believe you were expecting us,” Mairelon said. “Richard and Kim Merrill, pleased to make your lying, scheming, thieving acquaintance,” he said cheerfully, sweeping low into a bow while never, ever taking his eyes off the woman. 

It was the diamond of the first water from Lady Jersey’s dinner party. Kim stared. In a way, it made a sort of sense; that _was_ the last time she could remember being able to do proper magic. Why hadn’t she considered it before? The woman was wearing the same necklace she had been that evening, but now it seemed to be lit by some inner radiance, as if each pearl was a tiny blossom of wavering light that shifted from blue to green to purple. 

Mairelon dropped his hand, but raised the pistol a bit higher. The woman looked neither afraid nor pleased to see them. She was seated at a small table with a luncheon set out before her. 

Her Abigail cowered behind her. “They’ve got a gun, Missus! It’s even worse than we thought!”

Mrs. Simms arched a brow at this. She mopped at her lap and table ineffectually with a linen cloth. “Really, Susan? Worse than dragons? My goodness.” Kim begrudgingly had to admit she was a tough one; she showed no concern at all at having a pistol pointed straight at her. Mrs. Simms heaved a sigh. “There is nothing whatever to fear,” she said. Kim couldn’t tell if she was speaking to Susan or reading Kim’s mind. “They won’t do anything to give us difficulty. If they do . . .” She reached back, behind her head, and fiddled with the clasp to her necklace. After a moment she lifted her necklace away. “If they do, I’ll destroy their magical ability forever.” She smiled broadly at the two of them. 

“What do you want?” Kim demanded. 

“Money, of course. Money will do for a start.” The woman pursed her lips. “I hear that something unlikely happened to my . . . manservants. You’ve bested them, but no doubt it didn’t take a dragon. I’m unhappy to say I chose incorrectly when I asked them for their help; they were friends of my late husband. He met them gambling, so I assumed they were degenerate enough for this style of work, but as it turns out, they’re honest men.” She wrinkled her nose at the words. “Apparently they are better suited to be merchants than they are to play villains. I wouldn’t have thought; they aren’t very good merchants, either—though Toad is actually a rather skilled tailor.”

Kim could see that most of her necklace was glowing, but one pearl remained untouched. She stared at that single pearl. She thought hard about her magic lessons and dredged up what she could about infused objects. The were useful as storage containers for spells, and you wouldn’t notice someone using them to cast an invocation unless you were touching the container or the object the spell was intended to affect. The objects you chose usually depended on the kind of spell you were casting. And for a powerful spell, you’d ordinarily need a larger object. The fact that Mrs. Simms had chosen something so small was ominous. Kim blinked. And enchanted objects didn’t usually glow, either, unless something was off. Usually you chose an enchantment when you wanted to be subtle. And there really was not enough room in something so small to hold two magicians’ combined powers. “There ain’t enough room in that,” Kim said.

“Yes,” Mrs. Simms agreed. “It’s been a bit of a struggle, because of course I do not have magic of my own. But Flash Nan, she’s one of the rookery witches, she gave me the enchantment and a couple of other paper spells, too.”

“She gave you an _obelios?_ ” 

“I don’t know what you call them, obviously. And she didn’t call them that, but then she’s not educated.” Mrs. Simms smiled a little. “Which doesn’t mean she has no talent. After all, it worked. I used the paper spells to draw off some of the energy so that it didn’t fill up. But I didn’t expect it to fill so fast, and now I’m out of paper spells.” She tossed her head and smirked at Kim. “Flash Nan said once that happens, the enchanted item will break and the magic will all drain away, and you won’t be able to make any more. Of course, I could achieve the same ends by merely breaking the necklace itself. So we should probably do this quickly.”

“I see,” Mairelon said in that calm voice he always used when he was especially furious. 

“Yes, I’m sure you do. Be a good boy, now, and put the dag down on the floor.” Slowly, Mairelon did as he was told. “Excellent. Susan, retrieve the weapon.” She set the necklace beside her plate. 

“I ain’t no Bedlamite! They’ll magic me into some unnatural creature!” Susan shrieked. 

Mrs. Simms let out a long, long breath. “You’d best hope they do, because if they don’t, I swear I’m going to shoot you, you little ninny.” She did not even bother to rise. 

Susan, a little thing with huge blue eyes, blonde curls, and an abnormally stupid expression, only stared at her. 

“Kim, nudge the gun gently toward me with your foot,” Mrs. Simms instructed. Kim did as she was told. Susan skittered over to it and scooped it up, hurrying back to set it on the table as if she were afraid it might bite her.

“Perhaps it’s presumptuous of me to speak out of turn, but I really am curious; what did I do to make you want to take revenge on me in such a manner?” Mairelon asked. 

The woman looked disgusted. “How like a wealthy man,” she remarked. “I’m afraid, however, that this has nothing whatever to do with you, Mr. Merrill. I’ve never seen you before in my life—or I hadn’t, before Lady Jersey’s little party. It took me quite some time and a lot of effort, studying etiquette and language and bribing servants, to angle up to an invitation to that.”

Mairelon’s brow creased. “I’m afraid I don’t understand.”

“No, you wouldn’t. You think the world revolves around you. You’re nothing. I hope you realize that. You’re nothing whatever to me.” Her brown eyes gleamed smugly. 

“Then what the blazes are you doing?” Kim demanded. “Why’d you do all this, if not to cause trouble for him?”

“Because I wanted to cause trouble for _you,_ you fatwit!”

“Me?” Kim replied, stunned. She couldn’t fathom this. “Do you mean to say you’re in love with Mairelon too?”

The woman looked so angry Kim thought she might burst. “Of course not! I was in love with Sam! Dandy Sam! Do you not even remember him? Was he nothing to you? _Sam Bennett,_ Miss Merrill. He was _my Sam_. We were leg-shackled,” she spat, falling into cant. “And then you got him transported.”

Kim looked at her, stunned. “What do you mean, you were leg-shackled?”

“We took up house together,” Mrs. Simms told her defiantly. Kim made to say that she couldn’t of, that they were too young, but then thought better. A lot of couples were fast together by fifteen, on the streets. You looked for someone you could depend on. 

“Then Mrs. Simms is a sham name,” Kim guessed. “You lied.”

The dark haired beauty smiled thinly. “I didn’t. I was raised by my cousin. He beat me whenever I got within arms’ length. And I did marry a friend of his, much good that it did me. He was a grocer. He was old and worn out when I got him, and then he went and lost what money he had by gambling and left me a widow with nothing, save this house and his horrible peagoose of a niece, Susan. My name _is_ Emily Simms—much good that it does me, considering my husband did nothing whatever but bankrupt it.”

“I’m sorry,” Kim told her. 

“It’s nothing to what you did to me. I was moon-eyed over Sam and he would have taken care of me forever, and you went and got him sent away. And now look at you—a vulgar mushroom with all the fancies she likes and a handsome topping-fellow and then you’ve got magic to boot! So I took what I ought to have been given. I went to one of the rookery witches and had her make me a spell to capture your magic.” 

Just as guilt was beginning to creep over Kim, Mairelon stepped in. “Well, yes, one can see how that would automatically result in kidnapping, assault and theft,” he put in dryly. 

“I never stole a thing!” 

“What about our magical ability?”

She glared at him. “It should have been mine by rights,” she snapped. 

Her Abigail looked at her fearfully. “You should give it back, mum. They’s got _dragons_ in their pockets, they has!”

“Oh, _do_ shut up, Susan,” Mrs. Simms told her crossly. “And anyway, what can they possibly do? I’ve got their magic; they’re helpless.”

“No, Missus! I swear I saw a fireball, Missus!”

“ _They didn’t conjure any fireballs, Susan!_ Now _shut up_ before I _slap_ you!”

An idea sprung into Kim’s head so quickly and completely that she nearly gasped at the suddenness. When Mrs. Simms looked at her sharply, she smiled. “Not totally helpless,” she said. “I can prove it, if you like.” She sidled forward, keeping an eye on the necklace, and took the seat across from Mrs. Simms. 

“What are you doing?” Mrs. Simms demanded sharply.

“There’s no harm in it,” Kim assured her with a charming smile. She gave a slight bow in Susan’s direction. “Prepare to be amazed and astonished by the one, the only—Kim the Magician! Lend me your attention and I will show you wonders. The knowledge of the East and West is mine, and the secrets of the mysterious cults of Africa and India! Behold!” She brandished the linen table napkin, which she’d discretely snagged from the table while doing her practiced patter. 

Susan gasped at its appearance. “She’s conjured a napkin, Missus! She’s got the devil’s power!”

Kim heard Mairelon try to stifle his laughter, while Mrs. Simms looked distinctly annoyed. “It’s just a _trick,_ Susan. Try to use your brain.”

“Ah, but is this just a trick?” Kim went on. She made a coin appear in her hand, drawing another suitably-gullible gasp from the Abigail. “Now, this is magic from India, and as such, it will need spice.” Kim looked at Susan. “It’s essential to conduct the magical energies. Is there any such thing in the house?”

Right on cue, Susan cried, “Oh, use the pepper pot!” She bounced up and down on the balls of her feet. Kim judged she was more excited than scared, or that being scared excited her. Either way suited Kim just fine. 

“Excellent,” she said. She took the tall, ceramic pepper pot and sprinkled a dash of pepper onto the napkin. “This will help to channel the occult powers that I wield,” she told Susan gravely. 

“Ohhhh,” Susan breathed obligingly. 

Mrs. Simms snorted. “Of all the rankest—”

“Silence!” Kim thundered. “I am going to attempt to make this shilling vanish,” she said. “And for this I will need absolute quiet, or make no mistake, the demons of the otherworld will arise and we shall _all_ suffer a fate worse than death.”

Susan moaned a little. 

Mairelon had his fist pressed to his mouth, trying to smother his laughter, though whether this was at Kim’s improvised patter, Susan’s enthusiasm or Mrs. Simms’s contempt, Kim couldn’t say.

“I have only ever seen this shocking act performed once, and the man who managed it perished shortly thereafter. To this day, no one knows how he died. Now! This napkin represents the souls of the undead, stuck between this world and the next.” Kim covered the pepper pot lightly with the napkin. “As we all know, in ancient times, it was traditional for the dead to be buried with coins upon their mouths as passage for the ferryman, to take them across Styx, the river of hate, to the Underworld.”

“Ooooh, d’you hear that, Missus? The _Underworld._ ” Susan gripped Mrs. Simms’ shoulder tightly, and the woman scowled.

Kim put the coin on the table, then set the pepper pot atop it. “Sadly, often the coin was stolen and therefore their souls cannot rest; they search, ever, for the coin to pay the ferryman. Oh, ancient spirits, come to us now!” Kim moaned, rubbing the top of the pepper pot. “Come to me, and I will give you payment! Abracadabra!” At this last word, she jerked the pepper pot toward her and slapped her hand down on the coin. Very slowly she lifted her fingers, one by one, to reveal the coin was still there. 

Susan let out a small noise of disappointment. 

“No noise, please!” Kim said with authority. “It may frighten the specters away! I can feel them draw near.” Again, she set the pot atop the coin. “Cursed ones, I beseech thee! Prove my powers, thus proving your own! Abracadabra!” Again, she jerked the pot away only to slap her hand down on the coin, but this time, she let the pot drop into her lap. She took her hand away, revealing the shilling again. She set the napkin back on the table, a shell still in the shape of the pepper pot. 

Susan looked like she felt downright sorry for Kim, while Mrs. Simms glared daggers at her. “This is the most profound nonsense,” she said coldly. 

Kim smiled at her. “Careful, now. I think you might of just made a ghost or two very angry. You wouldn’t want to do that, would you?”

“Oh, wouldn’t I?” she drawled. 

“One last time,” Kim promised. “I’m almost sure I got it now.” She cleared her throat. “Forces of evil, come to me! Oh mighty demons from the innermost pit of hell, come now to do my bidding!” Kim milked it for all she had, moaning and rocking. 

Susan moaned and rocked in place as well, her hands half covering her face. “Oh, please don’t, Miss!” she begged. 

“It’s too late!” Kim cried. “They’re here! The spirits are on hand to receive their coin to pay the ferryman!” She moved the napkin again and slapped the coin. Slowly, she lifted her hand. 

“It’s still there!” Susan said, clearly disenchanted. “You said you could make it disappear.”

“I don’t understand. I can _feel_ the spirits,” Kim promised her. She glared at the table. “DAMN!” she roared, slamming her hand down on the napkin shell. At the same time, she dumped the ceramic pepper pot from her lap and it shattered on the floor under the table.

Susan screamed. 

Kim slumped in her chair as though she was faint from the exertion. “An oversight on my part,” she said. “Sometimes my magic becomes unstable. I must have accidentally shoved the pepper pot through the table.”

Susan screamed again. “She’s a witch! She’s a witch! Oh, God, I’m sorry for all my sins, that I am!” she babbled hysterically. Tears dripped down her face. “It was me who broke Bessie’s milk jug—I didn’t mean it—please don’t let her take me down to hell!”

Mrs. Simms was furious. She leapt up to grab Susan by the arms and shake her, hard. “Shut up, Susan! I said _will you shut up!_ It’s nonsense! It’s just a Canterbury story! It’s fake, Susan! Don’t you understand—it’s nothing but stage magic!”

Kim put her arms behind her head, feeling self-satisfied. “Oh, I wouldn’t say it was _just_ stage magic,” she informed the woman with a broad smile. 

The woman glowered at her, lowering herself back into her seat. “Oh? And what would you call it?” 

There was a sudden crackle and burst of light, as though lightning had forked down and struck behind her. Kim could see Mairelon standing behind Mrs. Simms. He was smiling his trademark boyish smile, one cuff was singed from the power of the magic he’d used, and his dark hair was wild. Kim thought she’d never seen anything so beautiful. The woman froze. She looked down at her hands, but found she couldn’t move them. Mairelon dangled the necklace in front of her, common pearls once more. 

“It was more than just stage magic,” Kim explained. “It was _also_ a misdirection,” she said smugly.

oOoOoOo

“That was the most outrageous magician’s patter I’ve ever heard,” Mairelon told her afterward. He kissed her forehead. “I’m absurdly proud.”

“All them fancy words ought to be useful for something,” Kim replied with a smirk. Mrs. Simms wasn’t going anywhere, and Susan the Abigail had readily agreed to turn evidence against her so long as they didn’t turn her into a frog or throw any fireballs at her. She was too busy sobbing with as much drama as she could muster to try running away. Privately, Kim wondered if she shouldn’t turn the girl onto the idea of doing actual stage magic. She made a marvelous assistant and had all the traits; she was pretty, credulous, enthusiastic and, Kim thought, a performer right to her core. 

“Kim! Kim! You ain’t hurt!” a wagon stopped nearby and Jem tumbled out. To Kim’s surprise, he ran up and threw his arms around her, hugging her hard. Mentally off-balance, she patted his head. 

“Yes, I’m fine,” she assured him. “She wasn’t ever going to get the drop on me.” She raised her eyebrows at Mairelon, who grinned at the two of them in a funny, thoughtful sort of way. 

Then Hunch came running up, and Mairelon gave himself over to lectures and beratements. “I told you, you never should of gone in there without me!”

Jem broke away quick, rubbing his eyes. “Hunch already had the Runners and he would of found us sooner rather than later,” he said. “I met him ’alfway between here and the Dog and Bull, I reckon.”

“I ’eard Kim scream and I legged it around the side of the alley and saw where they were goin’, but I couldn’t bring the carriage down there. It were too narrow. So I had to go and track down some extra ’ands, in case they were doin’ somethin’ dreadful to you.”

“I’m in your debt,” Mairelon told him solemnly, resting a hand on the man’s shoulder, and quite distracting him from the tirade he was about to launch into.

Kim grinned. “Yes, we both are. I don’t know what we would of done without your timely—”

“And gallant,” Mairelon interjected. 

“Timely and gallant rescue,” Kim finished. 

“You’re gammoning me,” Hunch said, but he looked pleased all the same. He brushed off any further thanks, saying, “I'll get the coach, then.”

“Did you figure out who the lady was? Did you get her?” Jem asked anxiously. 

Kim’s smile soured a little. “Yes. She was . . . a friend of a friend. From my old canting crew in St. Giles.”

Jem blinked. “What’d she want with you, then?”

Kim let out a long breath. “She was unhappy with me. You see, I was going upon the dub one night with the others. The house was good on the crack. It should’ve been easy.” Kim swallowed hard. “But I was too long with the last lock and the nabbing culls got us—almost every one. I got away, but Mother Tibbs swung because she ran things for the lot of us, and Sam—that is, Dandy Sam, he was, and . . . well, this woman, she was dangling after him. Only he got transported, and she had a hard time after that, and she blamed me.”

“Dandy Sam?” Jem echoed in a shocked voice. “That’s what she said?”

“Yes. Sam Bennett,” Kim clarified. “He was one of our crew, and she kept company with him on the side. And when I got us all snapt bein’ too slow with that lock, he got transported to Australia.” 

Jem shook his head hard. “But that ain’t right! No, that ain’t right! That was just a clanker he told people so’s they wouldn’t guess the truth!”

Kim looked at him. “What do you mean? Are you saying you knew him? Dandy Sam? Sam Bennett?”

Jem gave her an exasperated look. “Well, o’course I know Sam. I’m Jem. His cousin, Jeremy Bennett. And he didn’t get caught by no nabbing culls. He just set things up to look like that. See, after you did that house in Brighton, the Runners got wind of it and there was a reward and everything. And Sammy, he told me he could sit fancy for a long while on that reward. We hoped it was true. I warn’t but six then, and his dad had died that summer, probably ‘cos of drink. So it was just me and Sam and me old mum, who had a bad leg.”

“You’re telling me he planned it?” Kim said, staring at nothing. “You’re tellin’ me that Dandy Sam turned snitch on us?” She felt a slow boil begin inside. He’d let her believe all these years that it had been her fault Mother Tibbs had died. He’d let her think herself responsible for the loss of the whole canting crew. “That—that he’s a tattler and a wrinkler and a skinflint and a traitor?” Kim had to turn away a moment, fists clenched. Emily Simms was right to be angry. Her anger had just been as misdirected as Kim’s trick. 

After a moment, Jem got the courage up to come over and try comforting her. She felt a faltering hand finally come to rest on her shoulder. “Sorry.”

“He turned his own crew in for the reward,” she said dully. “Sent us to prison and transport and sent Mother Tibbs to dance upon nothing, and I thought it was all because of me. And then I suppose he took his money and piked off. Left me with nothing.”

Jem patted her shoulder. “I know, Kim,” he was saying softly. She looked at him. She should have seen the resemblance before; the same clear eyes, the same upturned nose, the same freckles and curls. The build was different—Dandy Sam had been on the verge of manhood—but the likeness was there all the same. “I know what you mean,” Jem told her. “He shabbed off and left me, too.” Kim blinked at him. He looked away. “I wish I’d of been smart enough to stop him.”

“It’s not your fault,” a new voice spoke up. Mairelon was nearby, and as he always did with hard luck stories, he was having a difficult time not getting angry on his friends’ behalf. 

Jem half turned away, embarrassed to be seen wallowing in a moment of sentiment. “Anyway, you got what you needed. I ought to go. Got a cove offerin’ me money for—well, I guess it wouldn’t do to tell, even if it is you two.” He grinned up at them. Kim noticed one tooth was just a little chipped. “It’s a little bit illegal, you see.”

Kim studied him a long moment. She liked him, liked him a lot, and now he would be living that same hand-to-mouth existence she once had, in danger every day. “Thanks for helpin’ me out with that bouncer,” she said hoarsely.

He shrugged, not meeting her eye. “Warn’t nothing,” he mumbled. “I got to go.”

“Are you sure?” Mairelon asked. “You know, we might be able to use your help,” he told Jem, his round face earnest.

Kim turned to look at Mairelon hopefully. He gave her a jaunty grin and she could see they were in accord. 

Jem was taken aback. “Me? What could I do?”

Kim gave a shrug that looked a lot more casual than she was feeling. “A lot ’as happened since I first met Mairelon, and it seems I’m not better at keeping him out of trouble than Hunch was. Our lives get a bit peculiar sometimes.” She looked to Mairelon, who nodded. 

“It might be useful to have someone along who’s familiar with . . . things. A lot has happened in the past several years,” he said.

Kim snorted. A lot happened _every_ year, when you were with Richard Merrill.

Jem looked from one of them to the other. “You’re both feather-headed. What do you want me around for?” 

“Quickly thought-up alibis,” Mairelon said glibly, his eyes shining. 

“Help shinnying out my window on a ladder braided from my own sheets at two in the morning,” Kim added. 

“Breaking and entering when necessary,” Mairelon admitted. 

“Feedin’ up and taken’ care of when not,” Kim added softly. “You seem a handy sort of person.”

“You ain’t gammoning me?”

“No,” Mairelon promised. 

“There’ll be as much food as you can eat, and books that will change the whole world and your head into the bargain, and a warm bed and—and people who care about you,” Kim blurted. She wasn’t much good at maudlin scenes like this, but it was important he knew.

Jem’s eyes were focused on something far away as he gave this consideration. “I thought Society was all fancy balls and puttin’ on airs and complicated writin’ and not payin’ your tailor,” he said slowly. 

“Er, well, there does tend to be a bit of that, too,” Mairelon said. “Although I feel I’ve always been scrupulously fair to my tailor.”

“There are hard bits,” Kim admitted. “Reading and writing aren’t learned in a day, and some of Society’s rules are . . .”

“A little constricting?” Mairelon suggested.

“Completely nonsensical,” Kim finished. “And the clothes are impractical,” she added, gesturing to her own sky-blue muslin dress, now torn in several places. “And you’ll have to learn to talk to sound flash, because you’ll be havin’ to talk to lots of nobs and go places like the opera . . .”

Jem was beginning to look as though he was having second thoughts. 

“You make it sound like a torture chamber,” Mairelon rebuked. “It’s hardly as bad as all that.” He turned back to Jem. “Oh, and I’ll buy you a horse. Would you like a horse? Kim doesn’t ride; I always thought that was a pity.”

Jem blinked. “A real horse?”

“Your own horse, yes, if you want it.”

“Richard Merrill, we haven’t had ’im a _day_ and you’re already settin’ out to spoil him!”

“All boys ought to know how to ride,” Mairelon told her with his usual stubborn tranquility. 

“I’d rather ease him into things rather than throw expensive horses at him. You always do this! He’ll be all overwhelmed and not understand, ‘coz you don’t explain things properly.”

“You’re takin’ me in?” Jem interrupted. “Really?”

“Yes; we’re offering.”

“What for? To raise?”

Kim and Mairelon exchanged a long look. “Well, it might not be the usual way of gettin’ a child, I admit,” Kim said. “But in case you ain’t noticed; we ain’t the usual sort of people.” 

Mairelon looked thoughtful. “Do you think we ought to stay awhile in Kent? Just until the wedding? I think he’d enjoy Kent and it might be better than tossing him headlong into Society. We can stay there at least until the wedding. Meanwhile, I’ll have to look about London and get some ideas for a place of our own. That sounds nice, doesn’t it, Kim?”

“Will your relatives still visit and make sour faces and throw random monkeys on me?” Kim teased. 

“I’m afraid it’s part of our marriage contract.”

“Oh, then any old where will do,” she said. She kissed him softly. She couldn’t have said how she felt—so happy she was nearly giddy. With Mairelon, dreams came true that she hadn’t even known she had. 

Jem looked at her questioningly. “Are you _sure_ about all this? I mean . . . I know it worked out for you, and the two of you get on and all that. But I ain’t sure I’d fit, and learning to read and talk and all the rest of it don’t sound easy.”

“No,” she agreed. “It’s not easy. But it’s worth it.” Jem seemed satisfied with this answer, and Kim put an arm around him, and one around Mairelon, too. “Besides, readin’ and talkin’ flash ain’t the end of it,” she assured him. 

Mairelon smiled and said some sharp, shiny words, holding out a glowing ball of light like a promise of the future. “There’s magic, too,” he offered. “You may not be able to cast it yourself, but I'm always looking for a good audience. And there will be adventures and mysteries,” he looked at Kim with shining eyes and added, “…sometimes even romance.” He smiled merrily. “Well, Jem? You do want to come, don’t you?”

Jem laughed. “Do I look like a looby? Of course I want to come.”

“Good. That’s settled,” Mairelon said with some relief. He turned to Kim. “Does it sound good to you?”

“Sounds bang up to me,” Kim said happily. “With Richard Merrill and me around, anything can happen,” she promised Jem with a grin. “Anything at all.”

**Author's Note:**

> The trick with the pepper pot was originally the "disappearing salt shaker" from the Klutz Book of Magic. As an ametuer magician myself in my teens, I once performed this trick myself to the kind gasps of my relatives. I hope it worked for you! Harder to describe than to perform. :)


End file.
